Earthquake
by Kibethan
Summary: [COMPLETE] When an earthquake occurs in Japan while Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being apart? And will Shuichi even survive long enough to see Yuki again?
1. Prologue

**Title:** Earthquake

**By: **Kibethan

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Gravitation, plain and simple, right?

**Summary:** When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Prologue**

Yuki sat in the airport waiting room. He was damn bored in his gray suit and deep blue tie. His legs were crossed, helping to support the newspaper that he was currently reading. His eye's scanned over the pages, learning that the Yankee's once again were going towards winning the World Series.

"We will now start boarding for Nippon Airlines flight 433 to Tokyo, Japan. Will all first class passengers, and anyone boarding with a child please make their way to the gate."

Yuki put down the newspaper, deciding that he could leave it for the next poor fellow who has to wait at the airport to read. He walked over to the gate and handed the agent his ticket. His ticket went through the machine and popped out the other end. He grabbed it, and then made his way down the jet way.

Once he got the end and into his seat, and flight attendant came by quickly and asked him if she could get him anything to drink. Yuki gave her a once over and decided that Shuichi was definitely cuter, even though she was pretty cute. He also decided that it was entirely too early in the flight (they hadn't even taken off yet!) for a drink.

"No, thank you."

"Of course, Sir, if there is something else I can get you, please feel free to call me over. My name is Yumiko." Yuki just gave her his customary cold stare and she sauntered away. He was happy, however, that he hadn't been recognized as 'Yuki Eiri' the author. He didn't think he could handle lots of fan girls (and in some case, guys) coming up to him and asking him for his autograph.

Slowly but surely all of the other passengers on the flight filed onto the plane. He began to wish that he had kept the newspaper to hide his face behind so that nobody would recognize him. But, since he hadn't kept the newspaper, he opted to instead look out the itty-bitty window of the plane. There wasn't a whole lot to see out there, but he thought that it was better to look at what was out there instead of looking at the people that were on the flight. He certainly hoped that nobody could recognize him if they couldn't see his face. He stared out the window until all of the other passengers had passed by him.

Once everybody was on, he sighed in relief.

"We will begin the takeoff procedures in a few minutes, please make yourselves comfortable," a voice informed over the P.A. system.

Well, a few minutes passed. And then another few minutes. And then another few minutes passed. Yuki furrowed his brow. Another few minutes passed. He looked at his watch. It was 7:30. The flight was supposed to have left thirty minutes ago.

'I'll give it another fifteen minutes, and then I'm asking what's going on,' he thought.

Twenty minutes later, he was searching for the flight attendant who'd called herself "Yumiko". Where the hell was she? He'd been in his seat for over an hour, and they were still sitting at the gate! Finally, he spotted her in the very front of the plane. He excused himself from his seat and made his way to talk to her.

"Excuse me, Yumiko, was it? Why haven't we taken off yet? This flight is going to arrive late in Japan!" His normal abnormally calm face was beginning to break as he began to rant to the flight attendant.

"I'm sorry Sir, but if you'd please return to your seat, the pilot will be announcing shortly why we have yet to take off yet." Yuki grumbled but went back to sitting down in the airplane seat. He was certainly glad that he had opted for the first class seating; he didn't know if he'd be able to take if it he had been stuck in the coach class seats for that long. Judging by the noise that was coming from coach, he figured out that they were getting pretty restless trying to figure out what was taking so long. The flight attendants that were back there were having a hard time keeping the people on board calm.

Yuki sat in his seat and dragged out his laptop. He figured that as long as they weren't taking off or landing, he might as well use it. This could be the only quality writing time that he got for a while, considering that he figured that the second that he got home Shuichi would be all over him, asking him how his trip was and telling him how much he loved him.

His thoughts digressed to Shuichi as they had so many times in the amount of time that he'd been gone in America. He thought about his pink hair, his obsession with Strawberry Pocky, and the way his smile brightened the room. Yet, as he thought about Shuichi, he couldn't help feel that something was wrong with the singer, like something had happened. He had been feeling that way for maybe an hour, which was why he was especially anxious to get back to Japan to check on him. It was probably nothing, but he couldn't help worrying.

When he thought about how he wanted to get back to Japan really fast he thought about how it had been way longer than the "shortly" that Yumiko had said it would take for the pilot to announce what was taking so long. He put his laptop down and was about to stand up, when he heard the P.A. system on button.

"I'm terribly sorry, ladies and gentlemen for the long delay. As it turns out, we will not be flying to Tokyo or anywhere in Japan today. An earthquake occurred in Tokyo about an hour and a half ago, and we were just waiting for information about how much damage there was at the airport. I'm sorry to report that it was a fairly substantial earthquake and that the airport's runways were damaged in it, so we will not be able to fly to Japan tonight. If you would so kindly grab your belongings and exit the plane, there are people waiting outside the gate with more information. The people will also have vouchers for a free night's stay at a nearby hotel until we get further information on when the runways will be repaired. Thank you very much for your patience and we thank you again for choosing Nippon Airlines."

Yuki sat in his seat, stunned. All the people around him started grabbing their things to exit the plane, while speculating about how bad the earthquake had been.

An earthquake that was strong enough to damage an airport runway? Weren't runways built to withstand large earthquakes? How strong was that earthquake for it to be able to badly damage the airport runways? If it were strong enough to damage the runways, wouldn't it be able to badly damage other things too, such as buildings?

A million questions ran through his head, but even through all the questions that were running through his head. One question kept coming back to his mind again and again.

What if Shuichi had been hurt?

**End Prologue**

****

Like? No like? Please, review and tell me what you think. (I know the prologue was a little short, but, come on, it's the prologue! I promise that the chapters will be longer)


	2. Chapter One

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Kibethan

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Gravitation, no matter how much I want to.

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Chapter 1**

Well, Shuichi had been hurt. Though, not too badly. Although, after all the adrenaline coursing through his body was gone, he was going to be in a lot of pain. He had a gash that was right near his temple that was trickling blood down the left side of his face, matting and staining the hair by his ear. His body was also spotted with bruises. But that was nothing compared to how badly Suguru had been hurt.

Suguru hadn't been able to get underneath the desk that Shuichi and Hiro were currently under, and had been thrown back and forth against the walls of the room. He was lying against one of the walls, unconscious. Even though the shaking had stopped, Shuichi was afraid to move out from under the desk to retrieve him.

Shuichi, Suguru, and Hiro had all been in an office in the N-G building discussing the new lyrics when the earthquake had struck. At first, it had sounded like a low rumbling, like someone was driving a huge truck past the building, but soon the rumbling escalated into violent shaking.

All three of them had been thrown against the wall, and they had all three tried to make their way underneath the desk. Shuichi and Hiro had made it, but just when Suguru was about to come over, a particularly bad wave buckled the floor and tossed him into the air and against the wall again. After that, he couldn't get his footing back, and Hiro and Shuichi could only watch in horror as the younger band mate was thrown from side to side. A few times they heard the sickening crack of bones breaking. They could only hope that he hadn't broken his neck or back.

Shuichi took one look at Suguru and all of fear of moving out from under the desk disappeared. He needed to get Suguru to safety. Hiro wouldn't be much help; his left arm had been broken during the initial slam against the wall, so Shuichi told him to stay there.

Shuichi raced towards Suguru, jumping over chairs and shelves that had been overturned. The room was in complete chaos, like a tornado had come through there.

'Only, it wasn't a tornado,' Shuichi thought. 'It was an earthquake.' He arrived in front of Suguru and let out a breath that he didn't know that he'd been holding as he saw that Suguru's chest was rising up and down. That meant that he was still alive.

"Suguru! Suguru! Wake up!" Suguru moaned slightly, but didn't wake up. "Please! Suguru, open your eyes!" Still nothing. It seemed as though Suguru was quite intent on staying in the darkness. Shuichi was worried though, he wanted to get back underneath the desk in case an aftershock happened, but he was afraid that maybe Suguru had broken his back, and that if he moved him, he could snap his spinal cord and paralyze him. "SUGURU!" Finally, Suguru's eyes fluttered open. Shuichi could pinpoint the exact time that the pain returned to him because instantly Suguru's eyes became clouded and his breathing became raspy.

"Shu...ichi?"

"Suguru, where does it hurt?"

"Every...where."

"Okay, I'm going to try to move you to underneath the desk, alright? It's really going to hurt, but try to stand it and stay conscious." Suguru nodded. Shuichi slipped his arms under the boy, and carefully lifted him up. Despite all his efforts to not hurt him, Suguru whimpered in pain, and it broke Shuichi's heart. With every step that Shuichi took, it jostled Suguru a little bit to the point that by the time they had reached the desk, Suguru was unconscious again.

They made it under the desk just in time, too. Right after they made it, but felt a sharp jolt as the p-waves(1) hit. Shuichi counted two seconds before the s-waves(2) hit, making the floor roll and pitch underneath them. Shuichi held on tight to Suguru and the desk, and when the aftershock ended they found out that they hadn't gotten any more injuries.

"We need to get out of here!" Hiro shouted. "This building isn't that safe!"

"I know, but what if another aftershock happens?"

"We'll deal with it; we need to get out of this building!"

"Alright, let's go." Shuichi picked up Suguru and ran towards the door.

The building that they were in had 8 floors, and they were on the 7th floor. Shuichi instinctively went towards the elevator, but realized that that would be stupid, so he veered off course towards the stairs. He was glad that there wasn't anybody else currently in the building because they were all out having lunch. Actually, the members of Bad Luck were supposed to join them, but when K found out that they hadn't finished reviewing the lyrics for their new album yet, he freaked out and threatened to shoot them if they didn't finish. At the time, Shuichi had been pissed, but now he was glad that nobody else had been in the building. There was huge potential for injuries in this building.

Shuichi raced down the stairs, one at a time. He would've gone down the stairs a lot faster, but he was afraid of tripping with Suguru in his arms. Hiro had offered to help, but Shuichi had given him a look that plainly said "And how the hell would you carry him with a broken arm?"

They had gotten down to the fourth floor when they came to a part of the stairway that was collapsed. Shuichi just managed to stop his momentum so he didn't go falling down the hole.

"Now what do we do?" Shuichi asked Hiro.

"We jump."

"What?!" Hiro went back up a couple of stairs, and then took a flying leap across the collapsed part of the stairway. He landed gracefully on the other side.

'Oh, shit,' Shuichi thought. 'There is no way I can do this with Suguru.'

"You have to try!" Hiro shouted, as if reading his thoughts. Shuichi looked skeptical, but nodded and back up a couple of steps. He then proceeded to run down the steps and attempt to jump across the hole.

He almost made it, too.

Luckily, he sensed that he wasn't going to be able to land on the other side, so using all of his upper body strength to flung Suguru towards Hiro on the other side. Suguru landed against Hiro with a loud thump. Shuichi raised his hands up and managed to grab the edge of the stairs. He had been so close.

Of course, now he couldn't pull himself up.

"Hiro! Help!"

"I'm coming, I'm coming." Hiro gently laid Suguru down, with his one good arm and walked over to Shuichi. He grabbed Shuichi's arm and with the strength of both of them combined, they managed to pull Shuichi up. It took a lot out of the both of them, though, and they just sat in the stairwell for a few minutes trying to catch their breaths.

Finally, after their hearts had slowed down somewhat, they decided to continue on down the stairs. Shuichi picked up Suguru, who was still unconscious, again. They got to the first floor with little incident, and then they moved towards the front doors.

Shuichi just happened to look at the walls, and he saw a horizontal crack running across it near the ceiling.

'That's odd,' he thought as he stopped running. 'What is it that horizontal cracks mean? I remember reading it somewhere. Oh yeah! Horizontal cracks mean structural damage. Oh, shit, we need to get out of here!'

Just then Hiro and Shuichi heard a loud crack and groan as the building readied itself to come down on top of them. The front door seemed like it was miles away and they began sprinting towards it.

The building started collapsing.

**End Chapter 1**

(1) p-waves are the "primary waves" of an earthquake. They're the sharp jolt that you feel at the beginning of an earthquake.

(2) s-waves are the "secondary waves" of an earthquake. They're the rolling motion that you feel during an earthquake. The s-waves travel slower than the p-waves, which is why Shuichi was able to count between the two.

Thank you to **Dntfckwifme**, **Suki**, **emerald-jade**, **graviaddict**, **Karasu32**, **goku-the-saru** (Katie-sempai ), **Juliana**, and **Youko-sama** for reviewing. I'm glad that you all like the story.

Still like? Or not? Have any of you ever been in an earthquake? Please review to tell me what you think of the story and if you've ever been in an earthquake. Thank you!


	3. Chapter Two

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Me! Kibethan!

**Disclaimer:** Gravitation, me no own!

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Um...half warning:** The reason that this is rated PG-13 is because of mild, MILD swearing. I'm just afraid of it getting deleted.

**Chapter 2**

Yuki calmly walked off of the plane. His face was blank; his mind concentrated only on how Shuichi could be hurt. In his daze, he had almost forgotten to take his laptop off the plane. In fact, the only reason he remembered was because Yumiko (remember her?) had mentioned it to him.

He stared ahead, not really seeing. On several occasions he ran into people. He got to the end of the jet way and into the terminal.

It was packed.

There were people everywhere trying to find a place to stay for the night. Someone stuck a hand in Yuki's face that held a paper. He grabbed the paper and read it. It was one of the vouchers that the pilot of the plane had said that there was going to be. It was for one free night at the Hilton. Another hand found it's way in front of his face, and again he took the paper that it was holding. It was a voucher for a free meal (drink, appetizer, main course, and desert) at Thirteen Coins.

All set for the night, he continued on towards the exit for the terminal. He didn't have his luggage with him, but he hardly cared. He timed it perfectly so that when he got outside, the Hilton bus was right there to take him the short hop to the hotel.

He walked into the hotel and checked in at the front desk. After he got settled into his room –all he had to do was put down his laptop and make sure all of the necessities in the bathroom were there- he walked downstairs to get some food; after all, it was fairly late.

The concierge told him that to get to Thirteen Coins all he had to do was walk straight down the street. She offered to get him a free ride, but he declined, deciding that it would probably be better to walk to be able to clear his head.

He exited the front door and walked out into the night sky. Thirteen Coins was open 24 hours a day, which was handy since it was about 9:30. It was an absolutely beautiful night; the sun was just starting to set. Yuki tried to imagine what the weather was Japan. He wondered if it was a bright sunny day, like the day had been there, or if the weather was all cloudy, rainy, and dark.

He spotted the restaurant and walked over to it. It was a small little restaurant on the bottom floor of a giant building. He walked in the door and was instantly greeted with a cheerful voice.

"And how many are going to be in your party?" the bubbly voice asked.

"Just me..." Yuki answered coldly.

The bubbly voice was completely oblivious. "All right, if you'll just follow me, we've got a nice seat over here." Yuki sat in the place that she indicated; he didn't even mutter a thank you. Once again, the bubbly voice wasn't phased. She walked away, and the real waitress showed up five minutes later to ask if he had decided on a drink and an appetizer.

He told her his order and she walked away, off to get his drink. The restaurant was surprisingly busy for being so late, so Yuki could hear lots of conversations going on.

"Hey, did you hear? There was a big earthquake in Japan," his waitress informed him when she brought him his drink and appetizer. The little tension that was in the room increased ten fold, twice over after she said that, from Yuki's cold glare. "I'll take that as a yes..." she walked away, only to return a few seconds later with a blush on her face. "I forgot to take your order."

Yuki ordered his food and the still embarrassed waitress scooted away, which left Yuki alone with his thoughts. Usually, that was how he liked it, however currently; he wanted a certain singer to be talking nonstop to him about his day. At least if Shuichi was with him talking, he would know that he was okay, instead of having to sit around and wonder.

Surprisingly quick the waitress returned with his food. He had barely had time to eat his appetizer, which slightly annoyed him since he had been looking oh so forward to eating it. On the flip side, he didn't have to wait very long for his food so he could get the hell out of that restaurant faster.

And eat quickly he did, so quickly in fact that the waitress even commented on it.

"That has got to be the fastest I've ever seen anybody eat a meal. Can I get you some desert?"

He was about to nod, but decided at the last second not to, even though it was free.

"No."

"Alright, well, here's your bill. Have a great night. Oh! And I apologize for my earlier behavior, I didn't mean to offend you." She walked away, but paused when Yuki called back to her.

"It's alright, I'm sorry, I'm just under a lot of tension," Yuki started, not quite sure himself why he was telling her this, "I was on a plane to Japan to go home but it was cancelled." The waitress nodded, accepting his apology and went off to wait other tables. Yuki looked at the bill, put the voucher on it, and added a 30 tip to it. He admired that the waitress –he never did catch her name- had the guts to come up to him and apologize. For that, he figured that she deserved a relatively large tip.

Yuki walked out the door and into the night sky. It had long since turned dark out, but he didn't mind, it helped to clear his mind. The walk back to the hotel was fairly short, and he arrived within a reasonable amount of time, with no problems (after all, he was in kind of a rough area) back at the hotel. He walked into his room and sat down on the bed.

His mind drifted to Shuichi, yet again, as he thought about how his lover was doing.

"Oh, fuck this," he said to himself. "I'm going to figure out how he is." He turned on the television and put on CNN to figure out exactly how bad the earthquake had really been. It was the breaking news story of the day, so it had a lot of coverage on it, including pictures.

The pictures almost broke Yuki's will, how could anyone survive that mess? There were freeway's toppled over, buildings crumbling down, fires roaring through the buildings that weren't down, bricks piled on top of cars...the list just went on.

"So far, an estimated 30 people have died with the numbers still rising. CNN reporter Megumi Yamamoto reports."

"Yes, it is a sign of complete chaos hear in Tokyo where approx 20 of the buildings have come down..." Yuki tuned her out. Shuichi was somewhere out there in that mess of things –possibly dead, and there wasn't anything that he could do about it.

And that was what bothered him the most. He was completely powerless.

**End Chapter 2**

Okay, I figured that I ought to mention that Thirteen Coins is a real restaurant. Hilton is a real kind of hotel (it's where Sakura-con is!), and I don't own either of them. Secondly, I'm not sure where in America that Yuki is, however, when I describe the airport, I'm picturing Sea-Tac in my mind. Okay! A review of reviews!

Thank you **aura**, I'm glad you're hooked , **Nittle Grasper Fan Joshie**, glad you like!, **MC-88** no need to apologize, I CRAVE reviews, **animelover**, thank you for the review, **Dntfckwifme**, there are so many ways that a person can be hurt in an earthquake, I don't want him to be too seriously hurt, too early on...wouldn't make for an interesting story, **emerald-jade**, I never thought in the world that I would be able to update so fast, and yes, I'm currently in Geology 104, which is called, ready, wait for it, "Earthquake!", actually, it's what gave me the idea, **Youki no ko**, I agree, there isn't enough about Suguru, **goku-the-saru**, I'm glad that you finally realize that it was me (I realized it was you...), **Crazi 4 Grasper**, really? what earthquake were you in? where?, **Moonfairyhime**, I'm glad you like!, and finally gasp, **Tanuki-dono**, I'm glad that you liked it, and I hope you like the chapter you just read too!

Reviews are like candy, they can be sweet or sour and they're VERY addicting, so please, review! Were any other of you in an earthquake? Answer in review! (P.S. I was in the 2001 Nisqually Quake, which was in Washington if any of you don't know. Had to be under that damn desk/chair thingy for 45 minutes because they were afraid of liquefaction, which is one way to die in an earthquake!)


	4. Chapter Three

**Title: **Earthquake

**By:** Still me, Kibethan

**Disclaimer: **Own Gravitation, I do not

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**'Nother half-warning:** There's a teeny bit more swearing in this. Hope none of ya'll's is offended. (Sorry, my English just went out the door...)

**Chapter 3**

Chairs were flying everywhere as the building collapsed around Shuichi, Suguru, and Hiro. Shuichi (with Suguru in his arms still) was sprinting for all he was worth to get out of the building. Hiro was right on his tail, cradling his arm.

Shuichi reached the door, turned around and backed through it. A split second later after the three of them got out, the building hit the floor. A relatively small chunk of the building hit Shuichi in the arm and almost caused him to drop Suguru. It also caused a huge gash in his arm, which began to bleed immediately. Of course, Shuichi didn't have any bandages, so he just let it bleed.

There were mass amounts of people outside. Everything was in chaos; Shuichi almost gasped. People were running every which way trying to find a safe place to stay, or trying to find a hospital. There were sirens ringing everywhere.

Shuichi started walking towards the nearest hospital, because he figured that that would be the best thing to do because if Suguru didn't get help soon...well, he didn't really want to let his mind stray down that path.

He took two steps, and was immediately run into by a woman in a hurry and was knocked down.

'Ow...' The woman who ran into him didn't even stop. Shuichi picked himself and Suguru off the ground, only to take another step and be knocked down again. He groaned and stood up again...and was knocked down again.

"Goddamnit!" he screamed out loud. "Quit knocking me the fuck down!" His patience was very quickly running thin, no matter how hard he tried to keep a sunny disposition. The weather wasn't helping either. It had started out as an absolutely beautiful day, with sunny and blue skies, and had quickly turned dark with black clouds of smoke covering the skies from a firestorm (1). And just like the weather, his mood was rapidly changing.

He picked himself and Suguru off the ground for the fourth time, and when another person ran into him, he braced himself and shoved back, knocking the other person to the ground. The other person (a man as luck would have it) glared at him evilly.

"I'm sorry..." Shuichi began apologizing.

"Yeah, and you should be sorry!"

"What?"

"You should be sorry, you knocked me the fuck down."

"Listen, I didn't mean too..."

"Look punk, are you trying to start something?" Shuichi was in absolute awe. Here they were, in the middle of disarray (he was carrying a body for goodness sakes), and some idiot was picking a fight with him! It shocked him to no end, and almost made him forget that he was currently mad at the world. Almost.

"No! I don't want to start anything; I'm trying to get my friend to the hospital and I keep getting knocked down. Now get the hell away from me!" He screamed at the man and he started acting really crazy. Luckily, like he hoped, the man was scared away. So there he was, back at his task at attempting to get Suguru to the hospital.

You would think that if you were walking around a city carrying a very broken unconscious body that **somebody** might stop to help you, but that was not what happened in Shuichi's case. Nobody cared.

All of sudden, it didn't matter that they were the band Bad Luck (which is seemed like they currently had a lot of). They were just ordinary people in the same boat as everybody else, trying to figure out what to do next. They weren't going to be favored over other people for being celebrities today.

Shuichi continued his task of walking to the closest hospital. He happened to know where it was because of one time that K-san got a little bit "gun happy" and accidentally shot Sakano-san in the foot. They had had to rush him to the hospital. So Shuichi walked on, with Hiro still behind him. Hiro had been laughing hysterically when Shuichi had had the brush with the pissed off man, so Shuichi was worried that Hiro was going into shock from his broken arm. Usually Hiro would've started to fight the man for him.

Shuichi started to walk into the doorway of the hospital. Well, he would've started to walk into the doorway, had the building not been completely collapsed in front of him.

"It's gone," he muttered to himself. "It's gone! No! It can't be gone! That was the one of the biggest hospitals in Tokyo!" All of a sudden his resolve broke and he kneeled in front of the building, Suguru dropping limply to his side.

Throughout the entire time since the earthquake, he'd been telling himself that it would be okay. Everything would be just fine. Maybe it was all a dream (he'd even tried pinching himself, just to make sure). But now...it wasn't okay now. Because he didn't know where the nearest hospital was, Suguru would probably die. Hiro wasn't in his right state of mind. NOTHING was fine. He had sugarcoated everything, and it had just all come crashing down on him.

"Just like Yuki always says..." he muttered. His head jerked up. Yuki! He hadn't thought of him at all during this entire experience. Did Yuki even know that there had been an earthquake? What if Yuki's plane had already taken off and didn't have a place to land? He couldn't believe that he hadn't thought of Yuki at all! Yuki was usually the first, second, and third thing on his mind. He had been so happy this morning, when he knew that Yuki was coming home, that he had even skipped to work. This morning seemed so a lifetime ago. But, here he was, kneeling down in front of a collapsed hospital that has God knows how many trapped in it, with Suguru and Hiro by his side.

He knew that he should try and help and get the people who are trapped out of it, but he was just so tired. All of sudden, he felt very dizzy and he fell onto his side.

'Hmm...maybe I've lost more blood than I thought...' The wound on his head and arm were still bleeding freely. He gently closed his eyes, and the last thing he thought was:

'Yuki...please help me...'

**End Chapter 3**

(1) A firestorm is a storm that is...well...um...caused by fire. I could go into a lot more detail, because I just learned about firestorms today in my Earthquake class, but I don't want to bore you!

Wow, another chapter done and done! Can you believe that I have written each one of these chapters straight from scratch every day. None of it is done the day before! Here's a review of reviews:

**Lesca:** Do you really think that I would kill of Suguru? No matter what Katie says..., **Dntfckwifme:** The jealous bug has bit me bad! I wish that I lived in the U.K.! I went to Ireland last year and absolutely loved it!, **emerald-jade: **I don't actually have a beta. And, I'll be the first to admit that I had no clue what "prose" was and went right to the Merriam-Webster website to find out. Thank you for the compliment, **Youki no ko:** Thank you for the review! I'll try and keep up the angst, **Suki:** Well...I try**..., lemur30**: I've kept the idea coming...and it will keep on going...just like the energizer bunny!, **goku-the-saru**: You aren't allowed to torture me! I updated!, **baka-onna2003:** Yep, the next one is in Shu-chan's point of view. In case you haven't figured out...it'll be every other one..., **Moonfairyhime:** Thank you for the compliment, it's greatly appreciated!, **Tanuki-dono:** I love long reviews! Thank you so much! So there was an earthquake in Alabama? Wow, didn't think that that was really possible...that's awesome! Earthquakes I can handle, Tornados? No way! I lived in Fort Worth when I was in 4th grade and have ever since been terrified of tornados. (Not that I ever was in one..but, I digress...)

I feel kind of bad, since that was so long...but, I always liked being acknowledged for reviewing, so I'm assuming that ya'll do too.

Anyone else in an earthquake that just hasn't "reviewed" up! If so, please tell me, I'd love to hear about your experience!

Remember! Reviews are like candy (they can be sweet or sour and they're VERY ADDICTING), and since (as **Tanuki-dono** pointed out) it's the month of Halloween, please give me candy (a.k.a. reviews). Thank you.


	5. Chapter Four

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Who else, but me? (Umm...Kibethan)

**Disclaimer:** I STILL don't own Gravitation, no matter how much I want it. (and trust me, I want it very, very much...)

**Summary:** When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Yet another, half warning:** There is still some swearing in this story. Try to bear with it. It's why it's rated "PG-13"

**Chapter 4**

Yuki awoke with a start. He bolted upright in bed, his heart beating wildly and he was in a cold sweat.

'What the hell?' he thought. He had fallen asleep watching CNN (as a matter of fact, the television was still on) and had been in a deep sleep when all of a sudden he had been awoken. He thought that he'd heard Shuichi...but that couldn't be right.

He shook his head, trying to clear his mind. He looked at the television. They were still reporting about the earthquake.

"The number of dead has increased to 3,000..." Three thousand? Wait a minute! Last he heard it was thirty! The difference was appalling. It had only been a couple hours since he last checked.

And, again, what if Shuichi was among the dead?

"I have to do something!" he screamed in his room. "Maybe if I called Shuichi on his cell phone..." He ran to the phone and dialed the number that he knew by heart.

"The number you dialed is currently unavailable, please hang up and try again. The number you dialed..." Yuki hung up and dialed again. He hung up after getting the same message again.

"Fuck!" He put his head in his hands, looking dejected. He couldn't figure out what to do. 'Tohma...of course! Tohma's phone is a satellite phone,' he thought. There wasn't an earthquake in space! Yuki quickly dialed the number, extremely happy with himself that he'd thought of it.

His heart skipped a beat when it began ringing, and damn near stopped beating altogether when Tohma's voice picked up.

"Hello?" Tohma's currently somewhat raspy voice answered.

"Tohma!"

"Eiri? Is that you? What're you calling for? Were you worried about your brother-in-law?" he asked slyly.

"No, I was just wondering if Shuichi was alright."

"I don't know. We were at lunch when it happened (I'm assuming that you know that an earthquake happened, right). Shuichi was still in the N-G building. We (that's K, Sakano, and me) were just heading over there to see if they (Hiro, Suguru, and Shuichi) were okay. What's the phone number for you the phone you called with? I'll give you a call when I find out." Yuki gave him the phone number and then he hung up.

He turned his attention back to the television. They were showing more pictures of the wreckage still. He found it hard to believe that that much destruction could happen in such a small amount of time. It would take years before they get everything cleaned up.

That worried Yuki, too. Exactly how long would it take for them to fix the runway? He didn't really want to be away from Shuichi any longer than he had to be.

It was taking Tohma a long time to call back. Yuki wondered briefly if he should've asked Tohma if he was all right. Maybe he was hurt, but still making his way to the N-G building for Yuki anyway.

He shook his head at the thought. Tohma wasn't self-sacrificing in any way, shape, or form. Besides, hadn't he said that he was on his way over there anyway? So what the hell was taking so damn long?

Yuki started pacing in the hotel room. It felt like it was getting smaller with every step he took, suffocating him. He wanted so badly to go for a walk outside again, but he was afraid that if he did, he would miss the call when Tohma called back, if he called back.

What if Tohma forgot to call back? If that happened, Yuki thought that he would probably kill him when he got his hands on him. Except, that wouldn't ever happen; just because sometimes Tohma is mean doesn't mean that he's absent-minded. He definitely wouldn't forget.

What if, thought, Tohma was avoiding calling back because it would be with bad news? Yuki ruled that one out right away, too. Tohma's a little sadistic and loves being the bearer of bad news.

What was taking so long?

Yuki's stomach grumbled and he figured that as long as he was up, he might as well order something from room service. He didn't even care if he had to pay for it.

Room service showed up thirty minutes later, slight pissed off that they had to work so early (it was around one in the morning). Tohma still hadn't called back, so Yuki was pissed. Two people who are both pissed off, meeting each other generally isn't a good thing. By the time that the room service guy left, a manager had threatened to fire the room service guy, and to kick Yuki out of his room and onto the street.

Of course, that hadn't made either of the parties very happy. They were still both pissed.

Yuki grumbled and went back to watching CNN again. He was beginning to develop a love/hate relationship with the program. He loved it, because it gave him some information about what was happening in Japan. On the other hand, he hated it because it was giving him depressing information.

"A firestorm is covering the city as some buildings in Tokyo continue on burning brightly. Recently, we got work that this earthquake was an 8.8 on the Richter Magnitude. This was the largest earthquake in Japan in the last 20 years."

'This is too depressing,' Yuki thought. He grabbed the remote and quickly changed the channel, searching for something a little bit happier. He landed on South Park and was so disgusted by it that he ended up back on CNN in two minutes.

Finally, after what seemed like hours of waiting, when it had actually only been, well, hours of waiting, the phone rang. Yuki ran to the phone.

"Hello?" he asked anxiously.

"It's Tohma."

"I figured, what news do you have, good or bad."

"Well, a little bit of both, I guess."

"The bad news first."

"When we got to the N-G building it was collapsed. I'm so sorry, Yuki, but if he was in there, I can't imagine how he could've escaped." Yuki almost dropped the phone

"What...was the good news?" Yuki asked as he choked back a rather painful sob.

"We didn't actually see a body. It could be that he got out of there before it collapsed." Yuki was silent. "Eiri? Are you alright?"

"I'm fine, I'll talk to you when I get back to Japan." Yuki hung up the phone and gently laid the phone back in its cradle. His eyes were completely dead. If the N-G building had collapsed, and Shuichi had been in it...there was no way that he would've survived. As much as he hated to admit it, and as little as he showed it, he cared for Shuichi quite a lot. If Shuichi died, then, he would probably die too.

'Of course, Shuichi might not be dead,' a little voice in Yuki's head told him. Yuki lifted up his head, his eyes holding a smidgeon of hope. That's right. Shuichi might not be dead.

With a lot of resolve, Yuki decided what he needed to do to find out if Shuichi was alive or not. But...it could wait until later; when the rest of the world was awake. Besides, if he didn't get very much sleep, then he was more prone to arguing with people, and he figured that that wouldn't help him very much on, what he considered now his quest.

He would start it in the morning.

**End Chapter 4**

Chapter four...done and done! And now, a quick review of reviews:

**Crazi 4 Grasper:** I know where Puyallup is! Thank you for the experience, and the review!, **Rebound:** Thank you for the review!, **MC-88:** Oh, don't worry, it'll keep coming, **Dntfckwifme:** I live in a place where it rains a lot too, I think a little change of scenary would be nice, and I'd already be used to the weather!, **emerald-jade:** I know it was a bit short...sorry...also, I realize that it's VERY unlikely that a hospital (much less a hospital in Japan) would collapse. But, I'm using a big of artistic license, and it is a BIG earthquake. Try to keep that in mind..., **Youki no ko:** Thank you for telling me about your family's experience with earthquakes, also the runways in Japan are destroyed (no plane, public or private...), **lemur130:** OMG. That. Is. Hilarious!, **goku-the-saru:** Katie. Um...you need psychiatric help... (j/k), **Seven7:** Yay! Please, elaborate more on your earthquake experience! Also thanks for the two reviews!, **Kolie:** thank you for the review!, **Tanuki-dono:** Another long review! I'm flattered! Also, I'm trying to spit out a chapter a day (doing a good job so far, ne?), **Little Fox Kit:** Thank you for the review!

Reviews are still like candy! Um...yeah... please review. AND THE RED SOX JUST WON!!!!


	6. Chapter Five

**Title:** Earthquake

**By: **Hehehe...me! Yep! Me! Kibethan. RA RI HO / LA LI HO

**Disclaimer: **Hmm...I could give you a whole list of things I don't own, and I can tell you that Gravitation would be on it!

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Actually, I don't think that there's any swearing in this chapter...

**Chapter 5**

Shuichi slowly stirred; his eyes fluttered open. He was still outside of the collapsed hospital. Suguru was still unconscious next to him. Hiro, on the other hand, was nowhere to be seen.

Shuichi sat up quickly, making his head throb terribly. It was so bad that he had to lie back down. He tried to think of where Hiro could possibly be, but it was next to impossible considering that fact that his head felt like a building was collapsing on top of it.

He was at a loss for what to do. He thought that it might be a good idea to go into the collapsed hospital to see if there was anyone there that needed help. He kind of figured that there would be people in there. But, the more he thought about it, the more dangerous it seemed like it would be. What if the rubble shifted and crashed down on top of him? What if there was another aftershock?

To prove his point, the ground rumbled.

Shuichi braced himself against the floor (with his arms covering his neck and head) as the ground started to shake to life again. He hoped that Hiro was safe wherever he was. The hospital rubble shook with the ground and flattened itself into the ground a little bit more.

All thoughts of not running into the rubble vanished when he heard yelling coming from inside there. Yelling that sounded suspiciously like Hiro's voice. Leaving Suguru laying on the ground, he ran towards where he heard the yelling, calling out Hiro's name. How could Hiro be in there? He had been totally spacey when he had been with Shuichi before. There was no way that he could've been better by now. Unless, of course, Shuichi had been out longer than he thought. Shuichi pondered that for a few seconds, until he realized that Hiro was still somewhere in the hospital.

Nothing mattered right now except getting Hiro out of there.

"Hiro! Hiro!"

"Shuichi? Shuichi help!"

"Where are you?"

"Follow the sound of my voice!" And Shuichi did, without abandon; because now he knew for sure that it was Hiro, and not just somebody who sounded exactly like him. Shuichi followed Hiro's voice to what seemed like the end of the earth. Except, it wasn't the end of the earth, it was just to around the side of the building. It only seemed like the end of the earth, because Shuichi kept running into dead ends where he'd have to climb a giant piece of the building to continue.

Shuichi soon discovered that Hiro was trapped behind a huge piece of concrete. He quickly figured out that in order to move the piece, it would take a lot of people. Only, there weren't any other people there, so he'd have to figure it out for himself.

He examined it, and tried pushing it from the side, out of the way. That didn't work. He tried pulling it from the front. That didn't work either. He even tried using his awesome mind power to levitate the concrete, and for some strange reason, that worked even less than the other attempts.

He sighed in frustration, trying to come up with some way to get it out of the way so he could get to his friend. After examining it over and over he finally came up with a way that it would possibly move. But it might be a little bit dangerous. He didn't really care though, he wanted, no, needed, to get Hiro out of there.

He started to dig underneath the boulder. He had dug for a while, and was getting sweaty and dirty (along with the bloody that he already was) when the boulder gave a little shudder. Shuichi quickly jumped out of the little hole that he had dug himself into, and the boulder fell a little bit forward.

It wasn't quite far enough for Shuichi to slip by, so he went back to digging in the dirt. After another ten minutes of digging, the boulder slipped a little bit further in. This time, it was **just** far enough for him get in.

"Hiro! Are you still there?" When Hiro didn't answer for a minute, Shuichi almost had a heart attack. "Hiro!"

"I'm here. Sorry. Keep following my voice." Shuichi followed his voice for a little bit further; he was amazed that he'd been able to hear him through all of that rubble.

He spotted Hiro sitting on the ground, still clutching his arm.

"You're alright!" They said at the same time.

"I was worried," Hiro told him, "you were out for an hour."

"What were you doing in there?" Shuichi asked him, not at all caring about that fact that he had been out for a little over an hour.

"I was seeing if there were people in this building that needed help. Especially if there were any doctors that could make sure that you and Suguru were all right. It was so long."

"Did you find any?"

Hiro gestured to behind him, where about 20 people were, mostly kids. Shuichi's eyes bugged out. He couldn't believe that he hadn't noticed the crowd at all.

"Thank you, Shindou-san, for helping get us out of here." Shuichi scratched the back of his head with his hand.

"Um...you're welcome," he said bashfully. "We should get out of here, before the rest of the building comes down."

"Yeah." The group (Hiro included) followed Shuichi to the opening. Everyone managed to squeeze through the tiny little opening that Shuichi had opened between the pieces of the building.

It was obvious that Hiro had managed to find the pediatrics ward of the hospital, because of all the kids. The adults, that were in the group, had to help some of the children around the bigger pieces of rubble. A little girl, named Megumi, which had been hospitalized because of a broken leg, was having a particularly hard time making the journey.

Shuichi noticed her plight, and let her climb on his back. It was a little bit harder with her on his back for him to move, but he decided that in the long run, it was faster than having her hop on one foot all around the boulders.

The people in this group hadn't really gotten hurt that much in the earthquake, or the collapse of the building, which surprised (and relieved) Shuichi. Almost all of the kids had streaks of dried tears running down their faces, though. They were all out of tears though.

Either that, or the adults had managed to calm them down. That could be; Hiro had always had a way with kids. A way with kids that Shuichi hoped that someday he could have. The more he thought about it, the more like the latter was the reason why the kids were so calmed down. Especially since a great deal of them were hanging onto some part of Hiro's clothing, making sure not to get lost.

Shuichi continued on making his way back to where he had left Suguru. Maybe one of the pediatrician's could help him. He led to group back to the front of the building.

It took about thirty minutes for them to finally back to the front. But really, that was to be expected because they were traveling with so many kids. Suguru was still lying there, right where Shuichi had left him, and, for a moment, Shuichi was afraid that Suguru had died in the time it took for him to reach Hiro. He was deeply relieved when he saw Suguru's chest rise a little bit.

One of the pediatricians (hereby known as Kyogoku-san) immediately raced to his side, without needed to be told a thing. After all, it was in their blood to help people. Another one of the pediatricians (hereby known as Kugyou-san) followed in Kyogoku's shadow. They immediately began trying to figure out what injuries he had, although, it was a little bit difficult without any instruments. But they figured it out anyway.

And when they did, they walked away with their heads bowed. Both Shuichi and Hiro both figured out immediately that something was wrong.

"Shindou-san, Nakano-san, your friend is in a coma from which he probably won't wake. A coma from which he will probably die," Kugyou-san informed him. Shuichi and Hiro both gasped. Memories of Suguru immediately flooded their minds.

Memories of when Suguru had joined the band after Noriko had joined back up with Nittle Grasper. Memories of when Suguru was yelling at Shuichi to get his mind off of Yuki and back onto his work. Memories of Suguru yelling at Shuichi whenever he did something wrong.

Shuichi frowned, he'd almost forgotten about those. He was willing to forgive them, though, if Suguru woke up. He did **not** want Suguru to die. Even if Suguru was a little mean (he was related to Tohma for God sake's) Shuichi couldn't imagine being in the band without him.

His mind was overloaded, and for the second time in only a few hours, Shuichi passed out.

**End Chapter 5**

Alright! Another successful chapter...done! I have been trying my hardest to produce a chapter once a day. (So far, I've been doing it...) to tell you the truth, I wasn't actually expecting to get this chapter out, since I upped my limit to at least 1,500 words a chapter (this one's 1,518). But I did.

Review of Reviews:

**Crazi 4 Grasper:** Thank you for the three reviews, they are very much appreciated, **emerald-jade:** What an experience! Umm...where is Mt. Pinatubo, I've heard that name before, but I can't recall currently where it is..., **MC-88:** Thank you for that review, na no da! (Sorry, I couldn't resist, I love reading and writing that...), **Youki no ko:** Yes, don't worry, Tohma realizes it , **lemur130:** Grading paper? What papers?, **Dntfckwifme:** I really can't imagine how it could suck there...and...like I said before, I'm attempting to update at least once a day, **Little Fox Kit:** I have a feeling that that won't happen for a while..., **Wizard:** I'm glad that you think it'd exciting! I do my best!, **goku-the-saru:** Are you obsessing over hot Japanese guys again, Katie? Wait...hot?!...does he look like he have a twin? Oh, and KANJI MO DAIKIRAI!!!, **baka-onna2003:** of course, like I said, Yuki, Shuichi, Yuki, Shuichi..., **Seven7:** You're talking about the Northridge EQ, right? I went to California right after that one, I was, oh man, seven...(kind of ironic since your name is Seven7)

Oh, and, I just feel like I should mention that I don't hate South Park. In fact, I think it's one of the funniest shows on t.v. (though, it is a bit...um...what word did I use? Disgusting.)

By the way, if any of you readers are ever on-line and bored out of your mind, feel free to try and AIM me. My AIM name is Kibethan (Bet ya'll didn't see that coming, eh?). I love to talk to people!

And last but not least. Please review! If you reviewed before but feel like you shouldn't now, well, you're feeling wrong! You should review. Also, if you've never reviewed before, but you're a little bit "shy" in reviewing area, don't be, because I'm a good person with bouncity-bounce! (from Daria...) So! You guys have no excuse to not review! Thank you, and good night!


	7. Chapter Six

**Title:** Earthquake

**By: **A currently quite tired Otaku, Kibethan

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Gravitation, I can't think up something witty to say...

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning: **Mild swearing in chapter...

**Chapter 6**

When the sun shone through the window that next morning, Yuki woke up. His eyes blinked rapidly trying to clear his vision. Had yesterday just been a dream? He took in his surroundings, and determined that it had all be real. Damn.

He sat up quickly, wanting to get to the airport, so he could be the first one there. Okay, he probably wouldn't be the first person, but he'd be up front. He had gone to bed in his clothing, so it was wrinkled, but he didn't care.

He grabbed his laptop (the only thing he had with him) and he headed out the door and downstairs into the lobby. He walked up to the front desk to check out.

"Your total comes to $74.23." Yuki's eyes got large, and then narrowed, trying to intimidate the clerk. It didn't work. Because he didn't want to stay at the Hilton for very long, he grabbed some cash and paid. He had given them the voucher when he checked in, and the $74.23 was purely room service, which pissed him off.

He walked out the front door and for the second time in as many days the bus came by right when he walked out and gave him a lift to the airport. He got off at the international gates and went to the Nippon Airlines counter. It was packed. The entire airport was empty, except for the Nippon Airlines counter.

Yuki couldn't believe it. He checked his water, it was 6:30. A.M.! What kind of crazy people come to the airport at 6:30?! Well...besides himself, of course. He walked into the ungodly long line and stood there. And stood there. And stood there.

Five minutes passed and he hadn't moved a step. Not a damn step. Another five minutes passed and he still hadn't moved. He looked at his watch, then at the ticket agents, trying to figure out what the hell was taking so long. After about another two minutes, he got to move a person length forward. If there had been a wall near, he would've started banging his head against it.

A few minutes later, he was staring straight ahead, his eyes unfocused and his mouth gaping open. In fact, people were starting to point at him. A couple of them even laughed. Yuki didn't care, he was in his own little world.

A world where editor's didn't pose deadlines on him. A world where he hadn't killed anybody. A world where he and his parent's actually got along. A world where Japan hadn't just had a huge earthquake. A world where Shuichi was definitely alive.

He stayed in the world for a while, until the person behind him kicked him out of his reverie. He spun around, glaring at the person who had kicked him. They also stood their ground.

"Move!" The person screamed. Yuki turned around and for the first time noticed that there was a gap in front of him. A small gap. A gap that hardly warranted moving any muscles over. "Move!" the person screamed again.

Calmly, Yuki turned around and said, "No" He held his ground.

"What? What?!" The person almost blew up completely. He started to attract the security guards. He had all their attention when he threw a punch at Yuki. Yuki, completely not expecting it, took the hit full on to the jaw. It was a strong punch, and almost knocked him down, but he didn't fall. It was definitely going to be a bruise.

The security guards came running over and tackled the man to the ground. The other people were looking on with amusement. The security guard arrested the man. Everything went back to being normal with the people still in the line. Everyone who was behind the person who got arrested was happy because they got to move up a space.

Now that all the excitement had died down, it was completely boring. He would've started typing on his laptop, but if he sat down people would think that he was a freak. Not that they didn't think that anyway.

And since they already thought that, he plopped right down and began working. Every time the line moved, he slid a little bit further along. The entire floor around the line would be clean by the time he got to the front.

He had finished writing the story he had started, and he had started writing a completely new story when he finally got to the front of the line. He checked his watch, it was almost 10 o'clock. He had been in line for over three hours. But, it wasn't really like he had to catch a flight.

"Next please." When Yuki heard that, he practically sung and almost pranced to the ticket agent. "How can I help you?"

"I was on a flight to Japan yesterday that was cancelled. Are the runways fixed yet?"

"No, sir, I'm sorry to say that the runways won't be fixed for about three months." Three months? Yuki thought that that was a very long time to be away from Japan. A long time to find out what happened to Shuichi. He was hoping that he wouldn't have to put is plan into action, but it couldn't be helped.

"Are the runway's in Korea ruined?" The agent looked slightly surprised by his question.

"Let me check." Yuki couldn't believe that she hadn't looked yet; after all, he couldn't have been the first person to come up with the idea, right? "The runways in Korea are just fine."

"Do you have any flights going there?"

"There's a flight leaving for Seoul in five hours."

"Is it full?"

"No."

"Please, could you book me on that flight?"

"Of course. If you'll just answer some questions." Yuki nodded and continued to answer each and every one of the questions. Fifteen minutes later he had his ticket in his hand and was walking to the security gate.

He got through it with absolutely no problem. He went to the international gate and lay down. After all, he had gotten very little sleep the night before. Even though he was used to pulling all-nighters when he was working on a book, his mind now was under slightly more pressure, so it was a hundred times more drained. He fell asleep on the bench.

Whenever you got the airport, there's always someone who's lying in the most uncomfortable positions that you've ever seen. Yuki was that person. As a result, he was getting a lot of weird stares. He'd been getting them all day. His mind dreamt in happy places, so while he was sleeping, he had a peaceful expression on his face.

He'd been asleep for maybe two hours when he felt a tap on his shoulder. He tried ignoring it, but it wouldn't go away. He cracked one eye open and spotted a little boy, maybe 8 years old at most, poking him.

"Beat it, kid."

"Will you play with me?" Yuki gave him a glare, but for the millionth time that day, it didn't work (he was going to have to find a new expression that struck fear into people). The kid didn't know to be scared. "Please?"

Yuki gave it to the puppy eyes.

He and the little kid sat there and played rummy and go fish for an hour. He hated to admit it, but he kid was really good, and was winning of his own accord. Yuki wasn't trying to lose! It occurred to him to ask where the kids parent's were, but he spotted two adults sound asleep in each other's arms about three seats away, he answered his own question.

After he had been playing with the kid for even longer, he heard an announcement for the flight he was on.

"Nippon Airlines flight 124 will begin boarding in a few minutes. Will first class people and people traveling with young children please make their way to the gate."

Yuki smiled inside as he began to board his flight that would take him to Asia. He gave his ticket to the flight attendant and made his way down the jet way for the second time. He hoped that this time, he wouldn't have to spend another night in America, but actually be in Asia. He had a good idea to take him to Japan. If he couldn't go by air directly to Japan, then he had come up with another way. Another way that would surely work. If it didn't, then he would be stuck in another country that he'd never been in before. He didn't want that.

As he entered the cabin, he took his seat in first class, which is where he believed that he belonged. The flight crew was different then the one going to Japan, and instead of having a cute stewardess, he had quite a cute steward. It freaked him out that this guy was so cute. But when he was thinking of that, he started thinking, again, about another cute guy:

'Shuichi. I'm coming.'

**End Chapter 6**

Hahahaha! I made it! It's 11:55! Once a day, it's still going! Okay, craziness aside... a review of reviews:

**The wolf hybrid fox:** Thank you for the review, and for the experience!, **Dntfckwifme:** I still think that the U.K. would be better than here..., **MC-88:** NA NO DA!! I love that...um...LA LI HO!!, **emerald-jade:** so that's where Mt. Pinatubo is...thank you. Maybe I'll kill someone off, maybe I won't..., **emerald-rei:** thank you for the compliment and the review, **Crazi 4 Grasper:** Another day, another chapter...like always, **Anna Sartin:** Why haven't you reviewed yet then?! Anyway, thanks for the review, **Rebound:** Thank you for the superb review!, **Dagger Maxwell:** Don't worry about updating a lot...I read a story once that updated like, once every two months...drove me insane... (are you like that?), **Nittle Grasper Fan Joshie:** Thank you for the review, and well...we'll see about Suguru..., **goku-the-saru:** west for south...Katie..., **Anime Writer2:** I'll continue, don't worry..., **Youki no ko:** Don't worry...you'll find out about the rest of the gang later, **Kitty in the Box:** Well, I'm glad you like it, **baka-onna2003:** Thank you for the totally awesome review!

I'm sorry if I forgot anyone!

Well, please, um...review! Thank you.

And that is that! (P.S., I'm sorry if there are any spelling errors, my eyes are starting to not be able to see...)


	8. Chapter Seven

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** A quite embarassed author, Kibethan...

**Disclaimer:** I do own a face that turns bright red whenever I'm really embarassed (like I was today...), but I don't own Gravitation.

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** I don't think that there's any swearing in this chapter, but be on guard. There might be.

**Chapter 7**

Two bodies lay down beside each other on the ground. They were both alive, for the moment, even though both of them were unconscious and they were giving the appearance of being dead.

At least, that's what Hiro thought. It scared him to no end to think that he might be the only band member left of Bad Luck after everything went back to normal. He wouldn't ever be able to pick up a guitar again. In fact, he would retire his guitar formally in public, just to prove to the world that Bad Luck cannot exist without it's three original members (after Noriko...of course).

Kugyou-san and Kyogoku-san were each examining one of the bodies. Kugyou-san always had a hand on Suguru's wrist, making sure that his heart kept on beating. Kyogoku-san did the same thing for Shuichi.

"Shindou-san's head injury is quite serious," Kyogoku-san had told Hiro after he had examined him. "I'm very surprised that hasn't collapsed until now." Hiro nodded, taking it all in stride. Or rather, he was acting like he was taking it all in stride. In his mind, he was breaking apart, and he was afraid that soon he would be passed out beside his band mates.

He thought about Ayaka, surprised that he hadn't thought of her yet. He was even more surprised of the fact that he was only half-wondering if she was hurt or not. Of course he'd be worried if she was hurt...after all, she was his girlfriend...but right now, all that he cared about was the fact that Shuichi and Suguru were both dead-looking. He didn't know how Ayaka was, so he just assumed the best and went on worrying about his friends.

He sat down next to the bodies, and just stared at them. Kugyou and Kyogoku found it slightly disturbing, the way that he didn't blink, but they just figured him to be in deep, deep thought.

And he was in deep thought. It was funny how after an earthquake, you get to thinking. You were lucky, but what if you weren't so lucky next time? What if next time was your time to go? Hiro didn't know if he could stand the fact that someday he would die. It hadn't really occurred to him before, but now that he thought about it, didn't everybody die some day? The thought was depressing, but no matter how hard he wanted to change his thoughts, his brain was stuck.

He changed his mind about retiring his guitar if Shuichi and Suguru died. If they died, then he would follow right after them. A quick slit of the wrists, and it would all be over and they would be playing their music for the big guy in charge. His eyes darkened considerably when he contemplated suicide. But, it was only if Shuichi and Suguru died, and currently, they were both alive. With any luck, they would stay alive too.

Hiro was still deep in thought, when he heard what he thought was yelling and a gunshot. It didn't make a whole lot of sense, why he thought he heard a gunshot, because guns were basically illegal in Japan, and the only person that he knew that had one was K.

K.

If he heard a gunshot, that meant that K was here. His eyes focused on what was in front of him, and he found himself nose to nose with Tohma. He gave a small yell and backed away as fast as he could. K and Sakano were being informed by Kugyou and Kyogoku how Shuichi and Suguru were.

"We found you," Sakano said. "You're alive! I can't believe that you're alive!" Sakano was shouting really loud, completely amazed that they weren't dead. Hiro though, was going to be deaf by the time it was over because Sakano was shouting right into his ear. How would it be, to have a deaf person playing the guitar? Well, if Beethoven could play the piano while being deaf, he could play the guitar. He continued to listen to the blast head on.

Tohma walked up to Sakano and tapped him on the shoulder. Sakano spun around so fast, that he fell over. Hiro was relieved that the yelling in his ears was over, even though they were still ringing.

"We went to N-G, you weren't there," Tohma accused him.

"If you didn't notice, N-G is currently not in working condition! Of course we weren't there."

"You shouldn't have left without telling someone."

"We needed to get Suguru to the hospital. Besides, whom was I going to tell? One of the many people that were running away from everything?"

"You got Suguru to a collapsed hospital, yeah, I'm sure that that really helped him. Because of you, Eiri is being forced to worry about Shuichi!" That last comment caught Hiro off guard. He had never really figured that Tohma was somebody to raise his voice, but he guessed that that happened to lots of people. Not only was Tohma accusing him of intentionally making things worse for his friend, he was also insinuating that he had talked to Yuki. He could let go of the fact that Tohma was accusing him of something that he would never do, because he was so curious as to when Tohma had spoken to Yuki.

"You talked to Yuki."

"Yeah, actually, he called me, all worried at Shuichi. He didn't even ask if I was all right. He didn't care at all."

"Should he have?"

"Of course! He had the nerve to call **my** satellite phone to ask about Shuichi! He didn't care at all that I –his brother-in-law- was also in the earthquake. He was only cared about Shuichi!" Tohma was getting random, and a bit scary. He had a murderous look in his eyes. "But, it wasn't his fault at all. Shuichi poisoned him against me!" Hiro wanted to point out that in fact Shuichi hadn't poisoned Yuki again him, but that he had poisoned Shuichi against Yuki. Tohma walked over to where Shuichi was laying on the ground.

And then he attacked him.

Kugyou and Kyogoku were quick to protect their patient. They leapt up and grabbed Tohma around the arms.

"Seguchi-san, We suggest that you rethink your plan of action. If you attack Shindou-san, we'll be forced to turn you over to the police." Tohma looked wild, and continued to fight against their hold, but they were stronger than they looked. Finally, he calmed down and all but fell asleep.

Kugyou put the back of his hand to Tohma's forehead. It was way warmer than it should've been. Tohma had a fever. A relatively bad fever too. Kugyou looked Tohma's body up and down, looking for injuries. He was actually surprised, too, when he found a rather large gash on Tohma's stomach. He wasn't sure how he hadn't noticed it before, especially since it was bleeding quite badly.

Also, the wound was obviously infected. It was bleeding, but it was also oozing a sort of pussy substance. It looked quite grotesque, but he knew how to patch it up. He couldn't patch it up though, because all of his tools were inside the hospital.

Hiro looked on with interest. It was apparent that the fever had made Tohma say (and do) some things that he usually wouldn't have ever even considered doing.

But was Tohma really harboring those horrible feelings for Shuichi inside of him? If so, that would mean some seriously horrible problems in fairness. It seemed to him that Tohma would start doing things that would make things not go well for Bad Luck. K walked up to beside him.

"I know what you're thinking. Don't worry; I'll make sure that Tohma continues to treat Shuichi fair. I won't let him discriminate." Hiro murmured a quiet thank you and tried to figure out how the American had learned how to read minds. "Practice," K said. That just creeped him out and he walked away, trying to ignore the creepy grin that K was giving him.

Hiro was glad that Yuki was worried about Shuichi. When Shuichi came to, he would tell him all about it, and he was sure that Shuichi would be super happy. Yuki was the thing that meant the absolute most to Shuichi.

He walked back to Shuichi's side and sat down again. He started to talk to him. He had heard once that people in coma's had a better possibility of waking up faster if you talk to them, so he decided to try it on Shuichi, even though Shuichi wasn't yet in a coma.

"Yuki cares about you, Shuichi. He cared enough to call Tohma's satellite phone and ask him how you were doing. He cares that much about you. You should be really happy." K and Sakano were giving him weird looks, with Kugyou and Kyogoku just continued on making sure that their patients were okay. Hiro hoped that somewhere deep down Shuichi was getting his little speech, and maybe just maybe, it would wake him up. He ended it with a final thought:

"Come back to the land of the living."

**End Chapter 7**

Okay! I finished another chapter. I don't have very much to say, except for I went to the Pokemon Rocks America thing in Seattle today. I'm ashamed to say that I had a blast because it was free! And you could win stuff! And you could people watch! cough cough, okay, so now a review of reviews:

**MC-88:** keep the na no da's coming. I like them, especially in the form of a review, **Sadako Sumeragi:** Is once a day fast enough for you?, **Moonfairyhime:** Thank you for the review , **lemur130:** That's awesome that you're a student/teacher. And, um, no, he doesn't speak Korean, if you get my drift..., **Dntfckwifme:** Please get well soon! I don't like it when anybody's sick, it's sad..., **Dagger Maxwell:** Another person from the U.K.? I'm so jealous!!!! Actually, I jumped the gun when I said two months, I've known people who haven't updated for approx 10 months too, **Sugar-Goddess:** I'm glad that you like my story, I wish you luck to never be in an earthquake, **ILLK:** I can see your point...but you've never seen a freakily cute guy before?, **Elements:** Whoa! The way you update is so cool because of the way it works with your name...thank you for the review, **Yuuji Kamui:** I'm still trying to decipher, was that half flame/half not flame? I have a hard time thanking you for flaming me, but I'm glad that you still like it. (As for the going back and forth, wall to wall, it was a HUGE earthquake. I'm using artistic license, **Seven7:** You're right, you would've felt it pretty hard in the San Fernando Valley. I'm glad you weren't hurt. You aren't that old just because you're seven (ha! another seven...) years older than me.

I apologize if I forgot anybody. I also apologize for any spelling errors. Also, my computer has been acting really fucked up lately, so if I don't update for a day or two, it's because I'm getting it fixed. Thank you.

And that's that! Oh! And the name's Kugyou and Kyogoku, whice manga are they from? Review me and tell me! Virtual gold stars to all that get it right! (I'll give you a clue, they're both last names).


	9. Chapter Eight

****

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Kibethan! A still very embarassed author.

**Disclaimer:** If I owned Gravitation, I can assure you that I would not be writing fanfiction.

**Summary:** When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Swearing in chapter! Swearing in chapter!

**Chapter 8**

We join Yuki on his flight to Korea. The sun is shining, the birds are singing...well, they would be singing if there had been any birds up there. All was currently peaceful. Though, not for long.

"I ordered that drink 10 minutes ago! Where is it?" Contrary to what you might think, it wasn't Yuki that was making a racket, it was a person sitting behind him. The cute steward (who's name was Daisuke) was having a hard time keeping the person pleased. Did he think that he was the only person on the flight?

"I'm sorry, sir, it's just, these people asked me for stuff first, so I needed to get it to them first."

"How dare you? Don't you know who I am?" Yuki was starting to get pretty pissed off. This guy was ruining his flight! It was a long flight too, and if the guy was going to be throwing a tantrum for all 20 hours of it, he didn't think he'd be able to handle it.

It's best to take care of problem right away, right?

"Excuse me, you're disturbing everybody here," Yuki said to the guy. The guy turned his attention away from Daisuke –who was very grateful- and to Yuki. Yuki held his ground, even though the guy was trying to give him a glare.

"Ex-CUSE me? Are you butting into my conversation?"

"It's hard not to when you're yelling like that."

"Don't you know who I am?" the guy asked him. Yuki had to admit that he looked familiar, and he was getting curious as to whom this guy was.

"No, I don't know who you are. But do you know who **I** am?" That caught the guy by surprise.

"No. Who are you?"

"I'm the author Yuki Eiri! Now bugger off and leave the steward alone."

"A fucking writer is going to scare me, so you bugger of--, wait, did you say Yuki Eiri?"

"Yeah, I did." For a moment a flash of fear ran through the guys eyes, and Yuki wondered why. Maybe he had done something to him in the past? "Who are you?"

"I'm not gonna fucking tell you."

"I suggest that you tell me."

"You did bad things to Ma-kun," the guy whispered. Yuki's eye's widened. Now he recognized the guy. He couldn't believe that he hadn't recognized him right away. It was Taki Aizawa, the bastard to did horrible things to Shuichi. Yuki no longer had any civility towards the guy and was going to start swearing him out, but he didn't get a chance because Taki looked so scared and wasn't currently doing anything bad to anybody so if he yelled at him he would get in trouble and possibly arrested in Korea.

He couldn't let that happen if he wanted to get to Shuichi as fast as he could. His plan was to fly to Korea and then catch a boat that would take him to Japan. It was a foolproof plan; nothing could go wrong. At least, that's what he thought.

One giant nap later the plane was landing in Korea and he could put his plan into action. As soon as he stepped off the plane he realized that he had made a huge tactical error.

He couldn't speak Korean. He couldn't read Korean. He couldn't do anything that had to do with the Korean language at all.

He was screwed.

He walked up to the front desk and asked if they knew where he might be able to catch a boat to Japan. Only, they didn't understand him. And he didn't understand them when they told him that they couldn't understand him. He tried speaking slower; it didn't work. He tried speaking louder; it also didn't help.

He got lucky though, because while he was talking louder, someone walked by that spoke Japanese and was able to become a translator for him for a little while.

"Can you ask them if they can tell me where I might be able to catch a ship to Japan?" The lady did what he asked her to do, and then told him what they her. He thanked her profusely and followed her instructions to go information desk.

The person who was sitting behind the information desk couldn't understand Yuki either and it frustrated him to no end. He started banging his head against the desk until the person reached out his hands and stopped him from doing it again. Yuki tried once again to communicate with the woman, this time using hand signals for water and for boat. He was gesturing to himself and trying to convey that he wanted to get onto the boat.

People were once again looking at him and laughing. His vein is his forehead throbbed. He wanted to scream so horribly. He momentarily stalked away from the desk and went into a bookstore. He searched around looking for any kanji. He finally spotted a Japanese-Korean, Korean-Japanese dictionary and immediately went and bought it.

He went back to the desk, the book in his hand. When the person behind the counter saw him return with a dictionary, she started laughing. He flipped through it and found the word for boat, and said it. The woman started laughing again at his horrible pronunciation. She grabbed the book and flipped through it, looking for the translation for how she would call the place for him and ask them to give him on a ticket for the ferry that went between the two countries.

It took them over an hour, but they eventually understood each other, and the lady was giving him directions on how to get to the ferry terminal. It involved a lot of driving, so she went ahead and rented a car for him too.

Yuki thanked her and followed her directions. The directions worked perfectly too, so soon he had a car rented and was driving towards the ferry terminal.

He had flown into Seoul, and the ferry terminal was in the very southern part of Korea, so it was quite a long drive. Three hours later, he finally got there. He was in luck because there was a place to drop off the rental car at the ferry terminal, so he could just walk on, which he did after he picked up his ticket.

When he handed his ticket to the person collecting them, he gave her a wide grin. It was a true smile, but it was kind of weird coming from him. The lady smiled back and continued on.

He was finally on his way to Japan. He didn't care that he would land nowhere near Tokyo. He figured that he would be able to make his way there pretty easily. He needed to get to Shuichi, even if Shuichi was dead.

The weather was absolutely beautiful, blue skies and everything, so the ferry was able to leave on time. The water wasn't too choppy, thankfully, and the passage was going smoothly. The passage was long, about a couple of hours. The rocking of the boat lulled Yuki right to sleep, even though he shouldn't have been tired because he had just slept for almost fifteen hours.

_Yuki saw Shuichi. He was lying down on the ground with his pink hair spread out like a halo around his head. His eyes were closed in eternal sleep, never to open again. Yuki himself was dressed all in black. For the first time he noticed other people around him, Hiro, Suguru, Tohma, Mika, K, and Sakano were all there. They too, were all dressed in black. Shuichi's mother and sister were also there. Everybody was crying, and to his surprise,e so was he._

_He was at a wake._

_He was at Shuichi's wake. _

_A voice in his head started talking to him. _

"_This is what will happen if you choose wrong. You must choose right! If you choose wrong, Shuichi will die!" The voice continued on talking to him for a while, always telling him that if he chose wrong, Shuichi would die._

"_Choose wrong at what?" Yuki tried asking the voice. But, like most voices do, it didn't answer. Instead, it started laughing evilly._

Yuki woke up instantly. The hairs on the back of his neck were sticking up, and he was in a cold sweat. The dream had scared him incredibly. He didn't want to ever have to go to Shuichi's wake. The dream had affected him way more than he ever thought was possible. He was so scared that he started shaking. What if he had already made the wrong decision?

No, that wasn't possible. The voice had said that he would know when he made it. It couldn't have happened yet because he didn't know if he made an important decision yet or not.

Still though, what if he had? Yuki contemplated that for almost a half an hour when an announcement came on the P.A. system.

"We are now arriving in Japan, please remember to grab all your belongings when you exit the ferry and also follow the signs toward customs."

'I'm finally in Japan,' Yuki thought.

**Chapter 8**

Finished! Yay!

One quick thing. I don't know how many of you know, but there was an Earthquake in Japan on Saturday. (Kind of creepy, ne?) Anyway, the magnitude was a 6.8. The magnitude for the earthquake in my story, if you recall, is an 8.8. An 8.8 is 100 times greater intensity, and released 900 times more energy. Just thought that you guys ought to know.

Okay, another review of reviews:

**Dntfckwifme:** I do spoil you guys, don't I? I hope you get better soon!, **Tanuki-dono:** Thank you for the review! And even I don't know where I find the time..., **XmakeXmeXfeelX:** I'm trying the one a day chapter, I'm trying. So far it's working..., **MC-88:** I know, the doctor's names are really similar, but they're from a manga, so I had to keep them loyal to the manga, na no da, **Dagger Maxwell:** There are two anime conventions here too...which reminds me that I need to register. Thanks!, **Anna Sartin:** I found out about the earthquake in Uwajimaya (a store in Seattle). I was kind of shocked because I'd been writing about that, **Ildreen Love:** Thank you for the review!, **goku-the-saru:** Ah!! There's a video of me on-line! Hehehe, **lemur130:** Maybe I will stop by, when are you giving it? And...I guess Seattle is kind of pretty..., **emerald-jade:** Well, I might not kill anybody. You like quizzes? I might have to give more of them then..., **Elements:** He's almost there...he's almost there...within the next couple of chapters I think.

That's it. Oh! And nobody even tried guessing where Kugyou and Kyogoku came from! I guess I'll give you a hint (though it'll give it away...) Their first names are Koki, and Aoi. That help? Review me and tell me! Still like, right? Thank you!


	10. Chapter Nine

_****_

**Title: **Earthquake

**By: **Someone who is currently on the search for a specific Gackt poster on-line and failing miserably. A.k.a. Kibethan

**Disclaimer: **I don't own Gravitation, that's easy enough to understand.

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Very mild swearing

**Chapter 9**

_Shuichi was surrounded by complete darkness. He was in a world without pain._

'_Where am I?' he wondered to himself. He spun himself around and around until he got dizzy looking for any shade of light. He looked towards his feet, but he couldn't see the ground. He even tried kneeling down and feeling the ground and was very surprised when his hands went past his feet without hitting anything._

'_Does that mean that I'm floating?' The prospect was very strange. He wondered where he was, but didn't think about it too much. He felt like there was something big that he was forgetting, but he couldn't seem to remember it, no matter how hard he tried. _

_He liked the floating in darkness. It made him not have a care in the world. As soon as he let his mind start to drift, he started to forget things. In what seemed like a few minutes to him, he had almost forgotten everything, including his own name. _

_He didn't care though. In the darkness, it was peaceful. All of a sudden there was a light somewhere in the distance. It seemed so out of place in all the darkness that he starting floating towards it, trying to get closer to find out what it was. _

_It was a lot farther away than it looked, but he was very persistent and kept moving towards it. _

_He wasn't any closer after he had been going towards it for what seemed like an hour. It started to annoy him that it was taking so long, so he started to run. He was surprised because he wasn't getting tired at all after running. _

_Finally it seemed like the light (it was white) was starting to get closer. It was pretty, just like Yuki._

_Yuki! _

_Who was Yuki? He couldn't remember. Shuichi stopped running. He was just short of entering the white light. Yuki...Yuki...it seemed so familiar. _

_He sat down trying desperately to remember who Yuki was. Why was he so familiar? He searched his brain for the answer but was having a hell of a time of it. His brain wouldn't remember anything. He put his hands to his face, trying so hard to remember. The white light was temporarily forgotten. Actually, if he had been paying attention he would've noticed that the light was getting smaller. _

_There was something fuzzy in the back of his brain; his brain was trying to think of it. Yuki...blond...all of a sudden it all came back in a rush._

_Yuki was his lover, the person he loved most in the entire world. He had been in an earthquake. Suguru! Suguru was still hurt! And Hiro. Hiro was there too. He couldn't leave them alone._

_He couldn't believe that he had forgotten! He started running away from the white light. As far away from it as he could. He realized that the white light was a bad thing, something that if he entered, he would never come out of it. If he went in, he wouldn't ever see Yuki again. He wouldn't let that ever happen._

_He kept running; the white light was getting even smaller and smaller until it disappeared completely. Shuichi slowed to a jog trying to find a way to exit the darkness. He started screaming for somebody to help him get out. He kept screaming over and over. _

"_Help me! Help me! Help me!" He screamed until his voice was hoarse. Even them he kept trying to scream, though it was coming out a squeak. He started jumping up and down. On one of his jumps, he jumped particularly hard and went sailing down._

_He fell, and he fell, and he fell. He just continued on falling. At first, it had felt like such a rush, but as he kept falling longer and longer, it started getting incredibly boring. He looked down and his eyes widened as he saw the ground. He was sailing fast towards the ground. It was no longer pitch black, but slightly gray. _

_He searched around frantically for a place to grab onto something to slow himself down so he didn't kill himself when he hit the ground. Alas, there was nothing to be had._

_Shuichi flew towards the ground and hit it. He was surprised when he figured out that he had landed in his body._

Shuichi's eyes flew open. In an instant, all the pain returned to his body and he groaned. When he groaned, his caught the attention of the doctors. He started to sit up, but Kugyou gently pushed him back down.

"Rest your body. It needs it." Shuichi did as he was told and he stayed lying down. Hiro came running over as soon as he realized that Shuichi was awake. He started shouting, and some small happy tears were running down his face. Hiro was crying? That had **never** happened before.

Shuichi looked over towards Suguru. He was still out cold. Shuichi inched himself a little bit closer to him. He turned on his side, and whispered into his ear.

"Suguru. Stay away from the white light! I mean it! Stay as far away from it as you can!" Feeling that he had done all that he could, he turned back onto his back into a more comfortable position.

He wasn't tired at all; after all, he had just had a giant nap. But he still just lay there, completely calm. Hiro was talking to him, filling him in on all that had happened while he had been unconscious.

"...Yeah, Tohma, K, and Sakano found us too..." For the first time Shuichi noticed them lying down somewhat near him. They were asleep because it was night. "Tohma tried attacking you because...Oh! Get this! Yuki called Tohma's phone too see if you were all right. That's why Tohma attacked, but Kugyou and Kyogoku stopped him. It turns out that he was running a fever..." So he had a fever, it didn't really excuse much, though. Shuichi always knew that Tohma sort of had a thing for Yuki, even though he was married.

Shuichi looked over at Tohma sadly. But then, what Hiro had said slowly began to sink it.

"Yuki was worried about me?!" He started exclaiming. He tried to sit up again, but like before, Kugyou put his hand on his shoulder keeping him down. "That means that Yuki knows about the quake! It means that he wasn't on the flight when it happened at that he is safe!" A giant weight was lifted off of his shoulder.

Yuki knew. Maybe Yuki would be trying to come to Japan to check on him! Okay, that was almost too much to hope. Besides, if Yuki came to Japan, he might get hurt. No. It would almost be better if he stayed in America. Even though Shuichi wanted to see him more than he'd ever wanted to see somebody in his life, he really didn't want him to get hurt.

But, if Yuki had done something as reckless as find his way to Japan, Shuichi wouldn't mind all that much. Like he had said before, though, it was almost too much to hope for. Especially since generally Yuki wasn't that reckless. It was usually Shuichi who was the one who was getting into all the trouble.

The best part of all, though, was knowing that Yuki was worried about it. It set a permanent grin on his face. It was a huge grin too. Yuki cared! Yuki cared! Yuki cared!

He was very glad that he hadn't followed the white light. He hoped that Suguru was making the same decision as him. He wanted him to wake up really, really bad. Just to prove that he was all right. Yet, Suguru kept right on sleeping, his eyes closed. He wasn't listening to Shuichi's thoughts.

Shuichi didn't care though, and he kept right on willing Suguru to wake up, to get away from the light that Suguru was surely following like he himself had. He had his eyes closed in such deep concentration that he didn't see Suguru twitch. In fact, nobody had seen him twitch. But he had. Suguru was heading on his way back.

Shuichi kept right on thinking him awake, not noticing how now instead of just twitching, Suguru was starting to shift around a lot. When Shuichi heard a lot of rustling, he cracked his eyes opened. He saw Suguru shifting around, so he starting crying out, urging him to wake up. He was almost there, so close!

Shuichi attracted the attention of the other people, and instantly they were all by Suguru's side, all encouraging him to wake up. They were making a lot of noise, but they didn't care. Suguru who had been practically pronounced dead was in the process of waking up! After hours of waiting, Suguru's eyes finally did something that everyone wanted them to do.

They fluttered open.

Everybody gasped. All the little kids who were in the group (for they were still there) started crying. So did a lot of the adults actually, even Tohma who was still recovering from the fever got teary-eyed at the sight of his cousin waking up. Suguru's eyes were unfocused at first, but Shuichi could tell that he was in the process of trying to focus them.

Suguru was awake.

He wasn't dead.

"Shuichi. I stayed away from the white light. Just like you said."

**End Chapter 9**

I finished! Wow! I really didn't think that I was going to get that one out on time...but, then again, I always think that... I again apologize for any spelling errors. There might be some...

A review of reviews:

**Dntfckwifme:** Is the time difference between here (where I am) and there (where you are ) 8 hours? I'm curious..., **baka-onna2003:** There might be another earthquake..., **lemur130:** What time on 11/3? I might have school..., **Sadako Sumeragi:** An update a day keeps the flames at bay...that's what I always say..., **MC-88:** I like being huggled, na no da!, **Little Fox Kit:** There's always something to say! You just have to search for it, **goku-the-saru:** Katie, you want everyone to die..., **Dagger Maxwell:** I'm 17 and going off to college next year too! I also need plushies!, **Seven7:** Actually, some people did die. I don't remember off the top of my head. Fat free cookies? And Happy Belated Birthday!, **Youki no ko:** Hehehe, Yuki's got quite the ambition to get towards Shuichi, ne?, **Elements:** I'm keeping up my pace, so you keep up yours! I suck in my Japanese class too...

And that is that!

I finally volunteered today at the YMCA! I taught cycling because the instructor didn't show up, and I was the most qualified person there (I mean, come on! I've taken all the classes expect C.P.R.) and there was somebody there to do C.P.R. in case of emergency! I'm so happy! (Did I mention that I wanted to be a step and cycling instructor?)

Anyway...yeah...I'm done...please review! Until tomorrow (which is theoretically in 1 hour and 47 minutes away)...ja ne! Hey! I think it's almost 6:15 (A.M.) in England!


	11. Chapter Ten

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Kibesen...that's Kibethan in Japanese!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Gravitation, Maki Murakami (a manga genius) does.

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Yes, there is swearing in this chapter. Beware!

**Chapter 10 **

Instead of following the signs to customs like Yuki had been told to, he followed the giant flood of people. He felt like he was in a school of fish. The group of fish slowly split up into two groups of people. There were the people that were from Japan, and the people that weren't. Luckily, the line for the people that were from Japan was moving quite fast and quite soon Yuki found himself to the front of the line.

"Name?"

"Uesugi Eiri." His birth name was Uesugi Eiri, so that's what it said on his passport as he handed it to the custom's person.

"Are you ever known as something else?"

"Yuki Eiri." The custom's person looked up.

"Ah. So I see. Welcome back to the country, Mr. Uesugi. If you have any agricultural things that you have brought back with you from-" the customs guy looked at the passport, "-Korea or America, there's a place right over there were you can declare them."

"Thank you."

Yuki walked passed the booth and out of the ferry terminal. The part of Japan that Yuki was currently in hadn't been affected by the earthquake that much. Sure, there were a couple of cracks in sidewalks, but that was basically it.

Yuki looked around for a place where he might be able to rent a car to drive from where he was to Tokyo. He knew that he was in for a long drive, especially since some of the freeways around Tokyo were probably impassible. But he didn't care. He'd do anything for Shuichi.

He finally spotted a rent a car place a little while away and he started walking towards it. After he got about halfway there, they thought for a bit and decided that maybe a bus would be the better way to travel. He would've taken the train, but there was little doubt in his mind that some of the track would be out.

Although, he wasn't sure where the bus station was. After he had walked around aimlessly for about half an hour (why ask for directions?) he spotted a bus. He only hoped that it was going towards the station in town, and wasn't leaving. It was clipping at a fairly fast pace, but Yuki didn't need to keep right behind it. He just needed to be able to see it if it turned or anything like that.

But, soon it was starting to go faster and faster and Yuki had to start running to keep it in sight. It began to go even faster, and soon he was sprinting as fast as he could to (with his laptop in his hand) try to keep being about to see the bus.

All of the bus turned a corner and disappeared. He turned the corner, just like the bus did, and it was gone. Vanished. It appeared to cease to exist!

"Damn!" Yuki thought out loud. "I'm going to have to ask for directions!" Yuki walked up to the nearest person and quickly asked where the bus station. He felt really stupid as the person he asked kind of gave him a weird look and pointed behind him. Yuki whirled around and saw a giant station with the word "Bus" written in really big letters. He smacked a hand to his head.

And if he hadn't felt stupid enough, he realized that the station was basically right back from where he had started. In fact, he could see the ferry terminal just off to the side.

Yuki shook his head and walked into the bus station. He got in an ungodly long line to try and find out if he could get to Tokyo. The line seemed like it was moving slower than the line at the airport had been. So, he did the same thing in the station that he had done in the airport. He sat down and began to work on writing his story, shuffling along when the line moved.

Only, the first time he did it, he'd been in America. Now, he was in Japan. Japan was a place of a little bit higher standards and while in America some of them had been staring at him, in Japan **all** off them were staring. And they weren't staring and then looking away when Yuki looked up, they were staring hard. They continued staring too, even when he gave them the evil mustered up glare.

There were so many people staring at him, that he was having a hard time writing. He was so sure that the people were reading his story. In fact, a little girl (she looked to be about 10 years old) was reading his story. She was staring at it, reading it. Yuki could see her eyes moving back and forth across the screen, taking in every single word.

Nobody could blame him for the events that followed. He was bored, damnit! Knowing that the little girl was reading word for word, Yuki decided to have a little bit of fun. He changed what he was writing to something a little less "G" rated. In fact, he went right through the ratings and landed smack dab on NC-17.

Yet the little girl just kept of reading. Yuki could tell though, that she was starting to have a hard time understand what was going on. She furrowed up her brow and pursed her lips trying to figure out what she was reading. She looked like she was thinking hard, which Yuki readily expected. What he didn't expect her to do though was to ask her mom what it meant.

Her mom turned bright red. I mean, BRIGHT RED. The people around the little girl had heard her ask the question, and even **they** turned bright red. Her mom immediately asked where she had seen such a thing.

'Uh-oh,' Yuki thought. The little girl gestured to his laptop and told her mom that she had read it off of that. Yuki decided to feign innocence and went just along typing like he had been. The line moved a little bit, and Yuki moved forward a little bit. The mother decided that she was going to have a little talk with Yuki.

"Excuse me!" Yuki looked up surprised.

"Can I help you?"

"What the hell are you doing writing that..." she searched for a word, "shit around kids?!" Yuki could tell that she was pissed, but he was mildly surprised at her swearing.

"Writing what?" He decided that he could pull of innocence quite well.

"That!" The woman gestured wildly to the words on the laptop.

"My story? What in the world was your daughter doing reading my story?" He switched the roles immediately to be the victim.

"Uh...um...uh..." The woman started searching for an excuse.

"And furthermore," Yuki decided that he might as well lay it on thick, "what were you doing using that kind of language in front of your daughter?" The lady really started stuttering then.

"Y-you s-s-still shouldn't be writing that kind of sh-stuff in front of kids!"

"One, I didn't realize that there were any kids behind me. Two, I should be able to write whatever I want. And three, you're child should've been taught to respect peoples privacy." Yuki knew that he had won the argument when the lady grabbed her daughter's hand and had stalked out of line. All the people who had been staring at his before had immediately stopped when they heard Yuki's speech on privacy.

The only thing that kept Yuki from writing with complete abandon was the fact that he was worried that the lady and her daughter were going to return with a scary boyfriend and that he was going to get beaten to death. But, five minutes passed, and there was no sign of any boyfriend, so he settled down and continued on writing.

Like at the airport, he had written a lot by the time that he got to the front of the line, he was almost finished with the story, in fact, because he had written a lot on the ferry too. He was going to have one happy editor by the time that everything was over with. When he got to the front of the line, he saved his work and went to the next available person.

"What can I help you with, sir?"

"I'd like a ticket to Tokyo, if it's possible."

"Oh! I'm sorry, we can't get you right into Tokyo, but if you like, we can get you to Kawasaki..."

"That's fine." If he couldn't find another ride out of Kawasaki, he could walk the last ten miles to Tokyo.

"Okay, I'll just need your name and credit card." Yuki gave her both of them and she happily printed out a ticket for the next available bus to Kawasaki. He grabbed it and sat down in a seat. He glanced at a clock and at his ticket to see when it left. He found out that his bus left in about half an hour and that it would be boarding in fifteen minutes.

He was approximately 450 miles away from Tokyo, but he didn't care. As long as the bus driver drove all day, they'd be able to make it there in about 7-8 hours.

Fifteen minutes later, he was on the bus, and thirty minutes later the bus was moving. Yuki was getting excited at the prospect of being able to get close to Shuichi. The thought that Shuichi was more than likely dead didn't even come into his mind. Yuki was so happy, that he even pulled out his laptop and started writing again. He felt inspired to write a happy ending to the story that he had started.

Two hours later, he was still going strong writing his happy ending. In another three hours he almost started banging his head against the side of the bus. He had finished his story and he was bored again. He didn't really want to start another story. Did you know that long bus trips were very boring? There really wasn't anything to do! Yuki's legs were starting to get cramped from sitting in the seat for so long.

He finally fell asleep again, (he wasn't going to need any sleep for a week after this was all over). He woke up when he felt the bus start to decelerate into the bus depot. He rubbed his eyes, trying to clear them.

"We are now in Kawasaki. I hope you have a pleasant stay," the bus driver said. Yuki looked out the window. It was starting to be dusk, but he could see that the damage in Kawasaki was much worse than the damage near the ferry terminal had been.

Buildings were collapsed, some streets were destroyed, and there were fires going on in a couple of places. Yuki was surprised that the buses were still running there (though he was glad that they were).

He exited the bus and started walking towards where he knew that Tokyo was. He couldn't see it yet, but if he kept walking long enough, he was sure that sooner or later he'd be able to see it.

He didn't even bother trying to find a taxi or someone to take his closer to Tokyo because he figured that no one would be willing to. Nobody is stupid enough to go to a place where it is most certainly dangerous. No one except Yuki that is.

Yuki kept walking. He kept walking even when it got dark. He kept walking even when his feet were crying out for him to stop. He starting scolding himself for having such a weak body, he was definitely planning on joining a gym to get into better shape.

The closer that he got to Tokyo, the worse the destruction became. By the he reached Tokyo two hours later, he was in shock. The pictures on the television had hardly done justice to how bad it was. It was chaos, and he was walking right into the middle of it.

Yuki started walking towards the N-G building. He had entered the city on the completely opposite end. He didn't care though, he had a destination and come hell or high water he was going to make it there. Several times he had to change his route when his path became blocked by debris. He walked around the city all night trying to get the N-G building. He had to retrace his steps so many times that the sun was beginning to rise by the time he actually reached the building.

His body went into shock again when he saw it.

'So, Tohma hadn't been lying. It really collapsed.' Yuki looked at it in wonderment. He was now sure that if Shuichi had been in there, there would be no way that he would be alive.

But, once again, Yuki was trying not to focus on the fact that Shuichi might be dead. He started to think logically. Shuichi obviously wasn't there (unless he was under all that rubble) so where would Shuichi go? He might go back to Yuki's apartment. Yuki ruled that out, there was a good chance that either him or his friends had been hurt. He wouldn't go to the apartment; he would probably go to the closest hospital.

Yuki remembered Shuichi calling him once from the hospital because he was there because Sakano had gotten shot in the foot. Even though Yuki hadn't wanted to go there, Shuichi begged him and eventually Yuki's will had worn down and he had driven to the hospital to help cheer Shuichi up.

He was now extremely happy that he had done so, because he could go check the hospital to see if Shuichi was there. He started racing towards the hospital because the more he thought about it, the more that it seemed likely that that was were Shuichi would be.

The sun was completely up by the time that the hospital was in sight. The first thing he noticed was that the hospital was also collapsed. His heart skipped a beat at the sight of the collapsed hospital. His eyes drifted a little bit further down.

His eyes came to rest on a group of people that were sitting and lying down at the base of the rubble. There were a lot of kids and couple of adults.

His heart stopped beating when he realized that one of the adults had bright pink hair...

**End Chapter 10**

Ha! Another chapter! This chapter is a lot longer than my other one's though...it's almost a thousand more words than the minimum that I set for myself.

A review of reviews:

**MC-88:** What's Kuma-chan version three? Is there another versin of Kumagoro, na no da!, **Kitty in the Box:** Trust me, it scares me too just how strong that earthquake was. It scares me even more how timely that my fic is..., **emerald-jade:** Her work is a little bit "formulaic" but I still absolutely love it. And you're right! It's from Imadoki! Also, I'm glad that I didn't kill off Suguru, too, **goku-the-saru:** You only want some people to live, some people you want to die though! cough, Tohma, cough, **Dark Mimiru-chan:** I'm glad you like it!, **lillie chan:** Is once a day fast enough for you?, **Elements:** yes, Shuichi did almost die, and thank you for the congrats! (Once again, I love how your reviews are written...it's so fun to read!), **Seven7:** That's alright. I can give you fat free cookies too, if you like...and thank you for the review!, **Moonfairyhime:** I'm glad you loved it!, **sol-nemesis:** I'm glad that you've been keeping up with it and like it..., **baka-onna2003:** I thought that it sounded like a sweet thing to do, too..., **Don:** Thank you for the review...kiddo...hahahaha!

And that is that!

I'm going to beg again...down on my knees...PLEASE...REVIEW! I'm so incredibly happy when I come home and I have an e-mail inbox full of reviews! Please, please, please review!


	12. Chapter Eleven

**Title:** Earthquake

**By: **Kibethan, who's eye's still hurt from crying...um...6 hours ago.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own Gravitation. I have never owned Gravitation. And in the future, I probably won't own Gravitation. (How's that for the three tenses of speech?)

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Slight...slight...swearing in chapter.

**Chapter 11**

Yuki stood there, absolutely speechless. It was Shuichi! There was no other person who it could possibly be! Okay, so there were probably plenty of people in Tokyo who had pink hair...but he could just _feel _that it was Shuichi.

He was in so much shock, that he couldn't move. His legs were frozen to the ground where he stood. His mind was screaming at them to move, but he couldn't, because his Shuichi was **right** over there. So close, that if the wind had been blowing in the right direction, he would've been able to smell him.

Now that he had actually made it to his target, he couldn't figure out what to do next. Sure, Shuichi hadn't actually seen _him _yet. But that didn't really matter, right? As long as he knew that Shuichi was safe...but why was he laying on the ground like that?

Yuki's heart started beating rapidly as he contemplated all the reasons why his lover was currently laying down on his back. Almost all the reasons in his head had something to do with the fact that Shuichi might still be _hurt_.

His legs forgot to be frozen, and Yuki found himself sprinting towards Shuichi with speed that he didn't know that he possessed. When he got close enough he saw that Shuichi's eyes were closed. That meant one of three things. Shuichi could be asleep, he could be pretending to be asleep, or he could be...dead. The first two were things that Yuki would be able to deal with. The third...well, he pleaded the fifth (1) in his mind. Unfortunately, his mind wasn't following the constitution very well, and the third reason was the reason that kept replaying over in his mind.

He almost started shouting out Shuichi's name as he got closer, but thought better of it. After all, if Shuichi wasn't dead and he was actually asleep, he didn't know if he'd be able to handle the cheeriness that would come from Shuichi. Also, there were **a lot** of kids around, and he certainly didn't want to wake them up. After all, they'd probably had a hell of night.

The closer that he got, the more relaxed he got. His brain had started to work, and he started to think that, logically speaking, the adults wouldn't have kept the dead body of Shuichi next to all of those kids. They probably would've been traumatized for life! Yuki chuckled a little as he thought about what those poor kid's dream's would've been for the rest of their lives if they'd been forced to sleep right next to the corpse of Shuichi. He was almost full out laughing as he thought about how twisted that they would probably become...

His thoughts shifted once again to Shuichi as he got closer and closer. As soon as he was by his side, he dropped to his knees. He was there.

He was by Shuichi's side.

And Shuichi was alive!

He was obviously alive. If he weren't alive, then his chest wouldn't have been moving up and down rhythmically in tune to his breathing. Yuki's heart began to constrict in his chest as he watched Shuichi sleep.

He looked so peaceful in his sleep, no doubt different from how he had looked during most of the last couple of days. Yuki frowned a bit when he saw the dried blood on the side of Shuichi's face. He started searching Shuichi for more wounds, wondering where else his lover had been hurt.

His eyes fell on Shuichi's arm, which was still bleeding. Yuki went right to work trying to clean it up. It looked like it had already been cleaned up a little, but it still needed to be cleaned up more, now that it had started bleeding again.

Yuki looked around for clothing that he could rip, but when he couldn't find any extra, he decided to use his own. He hastily took off his shirt and ripped it up into strips. He then took some of the strips and wrapped them around Shuichi's arm.

The entire time he did this, Shuichi didn't wake up at all. He lay there, deep asleep the whole time. Every once in a while, he would moan and try to get further into Yuki's touch. Yuki kind of figured that subconsciously, Shuichi knew that he was there.

He looked around and saw that there was another person lying next to Shuichi who's injuries were far more extensive than Shuichi's had been. He halfway recognized him as Shuichi's band mate. It wasn't Hiro; it was the other one...what was his name again? Well, his name wasn't important, he was still very hurt no matter what his name was.

He figured that since he still had some strips of shirt left (quite a bit, as a matter of fact) he might as well start wrapping the kid up. It was help the kid to lose less blood (he already looked half dead) and it would earn some major points with Shuichi.

When he started patching the kid up, so to speak, he realized that he was hurt a lot more than he had at first realized. The blood that was flowing freely from the wounds hid a great deal more injuries underneath. Still, he tried his best to make the kid look a little bit less like death warmed over.

After he had finished wrapping the kid (he still couldn't remember his name, Sugimoto...Sugito...what the hell was it?) up, the kid looked like a mummy. But at least the bleeding was beginning to slow, right? That had to count for something.

Yuki smiled at his handiwork. It had taken a little bit over an hour to complete the work, and he was thankful that he had gotten there when it was light out, or else it would've taken forever. He shifted so that he was seated next to Shuichi and decided to just watch him. Since it _was _light out, he figured that soon somebody would wake up and notice his presence. He just kind of hoped that it wasn't one of those damned kids.

Of course, somebody up there decided that he'd had enough good look for one day (after all, he had found Shuichi...). Yuki suddenly found himself staring eye to eye with an a little boy. He'd already decided that after having a little bit of fun confusing the little girl that he'd had enough of kids to last him a lifetime.

"Who're you?" the little kid asked him. Yuki didn't answer and averted his eyes to stare at Shuichi again. He figured that if he ignored the kid, that the kid would go away. Of course, things never go as planned. The kid actually had the nerve to grab Yuki's head and make him look him in the eye. "I said, 'Who are you?' And why are you looking at Shindou-san like that?" Yuki was surprised that the kid could actually have some respect for somebody that was older than him.

However, he was still pissed off that the kid wasn't treating **him** with any kind of respect whatsoever.

"No body, bugger off..."

"I said..."

"I heard what you said!" Yuki said cutting the off. He was still trying to let Shuichi sleep for as long as possible.

"Then why won't you answer me?" The kid started turning on the fake waterworks. Of course, Yuki wasn't at all fazed by them, getting them from Shuichi all the time. When that didn't work, the kid switched tactics. He obviously realized that Yuki wanted to make sure that Shuichi stayed asleep so... "I'll wake up Shindou-san if you don't tell me who you are."

Yuki narrowed his eyes. There was no way that he was going to tell the kid who he was. But, he couldn't let the kid wake up Shuichi either. He decided that Shuichi staying asleep was more important than the kid not knowing who he was.

"My name is Yuki Eiri. Are you happy now?" The kid looked at him in wonderment. Obviously he hadn't expected that he was going to win. Also, something else clicked in the kid's brain.

"You're...Yuki...? Shindou-san talked about you so much, that I really wanted to meet you! We should wake him up and tell him that you're here!" The kid went to start shaking Shuichi, but Yuki grabbed him.

"No. I think it'd be best if he let him sleep."

"He doesn't need to sleep anymore, though. He was unconscious for almost all of yesterday!" the kid told him. Yuki's eyes went wide.

"What?"

"He was unconscious for almost yesterday. In fact! He almost died." It took everything in Yuki's power not to start shaking information out of the kid. He didn't need to though, because the kid just started to spill it. "He collapsed after he led us out of the hospital rubble. It was so scary, because he didn't wake up. The doctor's told us that he might not ever wake up again. He did though. I'm so glad that he did."

"What's your name, kid?"

"Kousuke..."

"What do you say that we wake him up, Kousuke?" Yuki had finally decided that Shuichi had slept for long enough. He was especially worried, now that Kousuke had told him that Shuichi had been unconscious, that he wouldn't wake up. Kousuke had a huge grin on his face and he nodded enthusiastically.

"Okay!" Yuki and Kousuke immediately started shaking Shuichi every which direction that they could. Pulling and pushing; pushing and pulling. Yuki got worried when Shuichi didn't open his eyes right away, but felt immense relief when he did. "Shindou-san!" Kousuke cried.

"Oh, good morning, Kousuke. Good morning, Yuki..." Yuki watched as the shock registered on Shuichi's face as he realized what he just said. "Yuki?!?!?!" He stood up quickly, not even caring about the dizzy rush that befell him when he did. "Yuki! You're really here? Yuki!" Yuki stood up and Shuichi jumped into his arms, incredibly, incredibly happy. Yuki swung Shuichi around in a circle, happy to finally have him in his arms. Even Kousuke was standing out of the way, because he knew that Shuichi was really happy.

Unfortunately, Shuichi's happiness was to be short lived as the ground roared to life one more time...

**End Chapter 11**

Okay, I'm sorry that I didn't get a chapter out yesterday...I was just really busy. Okay, that's kind of a lie, but I can try, right? I was actually reading one of the best Yugi/Yami stories that I've ever read in my entire life, and I had to make dinner, and I had to go to step class, and I had to watch the red sox finally win. And, of coruse, I just **had **to see who got kicked off of America's Next Top Model. (It was Kelle...)

Anyway, a review of reviews:

Dookin: Well...that was another chapter...and tomorrow there'll probably be another chapter..., ImpishyNymph: I just love writing cliffies!, Youki no ko: Yes, we'll have to find out Tohma's reaction...next chapter..., Seven7: I'm glad that you like it as much to write out "please" as an acronym...I wonder what it stands for?, CassiToTheStars: I'm glad that you like it..., Sadako Sumeragi: And my ego just swelled about ten points...keep it up..., emerald-jade: Nope, no quiz. Did you like that quote?, Elements: I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't get the chapter out yesterday, I was quite busy (see A/N for details...) anyway, I hope you still like and review my story!, Shirubaa Kitsune: I'd say that it counts pretty closely..., Dark Mimiru-Chan: Well...I try..., lemur130: I wish I could see it! But...alas...I have class. Actually, ironically, I have my earthquake class at that time...I really wish I could see it though. I hope you do well! (Oh, and there's definitely some more angst coming...just you wait and see...), MC-88: I wish that I had a Kuma-plushie! I need to find one...or make one...na no da, Weeble Wobble Chic: Are you saying that I have an evil mind? I hope that this update is soon enough..., Kitty in the Box: I like intensity...smiles evilly..., emerald-rei: I'm glad that you like it, I try to update as fast as I can..., Sugar-Goddess: Well...it made him forget about everything else..., goku-the-saru: Isn't it obvious that I'm trying to kill you? Jeez, Katie, I thought that you could catch onto that!...j/k..., Dagger Maxwell: I'm sorry that it wouldn't let you let log on. Oh! And my name (Heather) is Hezaa in Japanese. Wow...I never realized how weird it looked spelled on in the romaji..., SoraLover1: We'll find out about Shuichi...later...

And that's the end of that!

Again, I'm sorry about the not updating thing. You know what's funny though, I got more reviews for that chapter than any other chapter that I've written, because it was out there for longer. Do you think I shouldn't update everyday? Or that I should? Also! I've been starting to wonder the gender of my readers (I think most of you are girls...) and I was wondering if you could add what gender you were to your review...just as a sort of poll, as it were.

And a quiz! What manga/anime is the name Kousuke/Kosuke (I can't really remember how it's spelled) from? I'll give you a major hint. He's the father.

Thanks, and until next time...probably tomorrow...ja ne!


	13. Chapter Twelve

**Title: **Earthquake

**By: **Kibethan, who's very sorry for taking so long to update.

**Disclaimer:** Kibethan doesn't own Gravitation

**Summary:** When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Um...I can't warn you, or else it would give away the chapter.

**Chapter 12**

At first, Shuichi wasn't exactly sure what was happening. He thought that he was imagining the ground moving because he was so happy and that the Gods were happy with him so they were just jumping up and down with him. He was just _so _happy at seeing Yuki.

But when someone screamed "Earthquake" he was shaken back to reality. Almost everyone had still been asleep, but they were all jostled awake when it started happening. The little kids started crying again; Hiro, Kyogoku, and Kugyou started gathering them all up and tried to move them to a safer location. The area around the hospital rubble was no longer safe.

Shuichi immediately ran to start helping them too. Yuki, on the other hand, just stood there, not exactly sure what to do. He noticed that Shuichi's band mate (he'd finally remembered that his name was "Suguru") was still just lying there. He decided that the wisest thing to do would be to try and help him. He ran over there, grabbed him, and started to get out of the area.

He was almost completely out of the area too, when he heard a cry of help. He wheeled around and saw Kousuke running around trying to dodge the rubble that was flying everywhere.

Yuki watched in horror as a large piece of rubble crashed down on top of the boy, pinning him flat. At first, Kousuke has screamed a heartbreaking painful scream, which practically broke Yuki's heart, but when it was sharply silenced, that's when Yuki really worried.

Unfortunately, he couldn't really do anything about it with Suguru in his arms. He set off to rid himself of the burden so he could see if he could do anything about helping Kousuke...that is...if he was still alive.

The entire time he was contemplating everything, the ground was still shaking. Luckily, though, it was starting to slow down to the point of being able to walk a bit more steadily, so Yuki was able to run to where the rest of the group was and put Suguru down.

While the K was doing a head count, he ran back to where he had last seen Kousuke. During the time that he was running, he was also calling out Kousuke's name trying to find out if he was awake or not. The closer he got to where Kousuke was, the grimmer it was starting to look. Kousuke still was answering him. When Yuki looked around, it didn't seem like there was any chance that anyone (especially a child who was hospitalized with God knows what) would've survived being hit by any debris that had flown around here.

He finally got to the piece that had hit Kousuke. It was a lot bigger than he had first thought, although, it wasn't too big for Yuki to move. He didn't want to move it, though, because he would've had to roll it, and he didn't want to cause Kousuke any more pain than necessary. He walked around to where he would've been able to see Kousuke's face, and grimaced when he finally did see it. Kousuke's eyes were closed and there was a pained expression that was written all over his face.

Kousuke's eyes sprung open.

They were glossy and feverish. Yuki's breath caught in his throat. He rushed to Kousuke's side. Even though he had only known the kid for maybe an hour, he didn't like it when anybody was in pain.

Kousuke looked at him, barely recognizing him.

"Yu..." Kousuke trailed off as he started coughing. It worried Yuki to no end that Kousuke was coughing up blood. Kousuke looked really scared. He knew that coughing up blood was a bad thing. His eyes turned to be full of fear. Yuki wanted to erase that fear, but he couldn't. Yuki watched helplessly as Kousuke's eyes turned blank.

He rolled the rubble off of Kousuke, no longer caring if he hurt him. It didn't matter if he hurt him more, as long as he didn't die.

He put his hand up to Kousuke's throat to feel for a pulse. The boy's skin was so pale and clammy. He couldn't feel a pulse, no matter how hard he tried to. He felt around for what must've been five minutes, trying to get a pulse. His eyes finally drifted to below his collarbone, where the boulder had been.

He was shocked when he could see clearly that all of Kousuke's ribs had been broken, as well as his back. Several of the rib bones were sticking through his chest, having had been snapped.

There was no way that Kousuke would've been able to survive that, and he hadn't.

Kousuke was, quite obviously, dead.

Yuki bowed his head, trying to hide the tears that were starting to come to his eyes. Shuichi came running up to him, and was dismayed when he saw him crying. It was then that he noticed Kousuke lying on the ground.

He sunk to his knees and started sobbing. He had tried so hard to not lose anybody, but the sight of the mangled body before him was too much. The other adults of the group (excluding Hiro (he was watching the kids) and Tohma (still very feverish)) ran over to see what the problem was.

When the two doctors saw the boy they started demanding what had happened. Kousuke had been their patient for a long time and had been one of the best one's that they'd had. When they asked what had happened, all Yuki had to do was point to the piece of rubble that was now covered in Kousuke's blood and they figured it out pretty quick.

All of the people that were standing then knelt and started praying for Kousuke. They were no longer praying for him to live, for they all knew that he was dead; they were praying for his soul to be saved and that may he forever rest in piece.

Kousuke was the first death in the earthquake that Shuichi had actually seen. The sight was burned into the back of his eyelids and whenever he closed his eyes, he saw the mangled sight.

He buried his head in Yuki's chest, looking for some consolation. Yuki however was hard pressed to give it. He needed to receive it too.

He felt like it was his entire fault because he hadn't tried enough to save the young boy. He felt like he had killed somebody else, and inside, it killed him.

Yuki's mind was overloaded and he collapsed beside the body.

**End Chapter 12**

I apologize! I apologize! Okay, I have an excuse. Are you ready? I got home from work on Friday, and my computer wasn't here. "Mom. Where is the computer?" "Oh, Heather, we took it in to get fixed." "Oh." Okay, maybe it didn't go exactly like that, but that's the gist of it. Also, sorry that this chapter is a wee bit short, I promise that the next chapter will be longer.

Okay, author's notes:

**Ildreen Love:** Sorry that it didn't exactly translate to mean longer chapter, but maybe it will next chapter, **Dagger Maxwell:** It's hard not to be obsessed with Y/Y, but it's weird considering I'm not a huge fan of Yu-Gi-Oh..., **Kitty in the Box:** I'm glad you liked it, **emerald-jade:** With a name like Heather, I'm glad I'm a girl too...(I didn't realize that there were very many Kousuke's, sorry), **Beste:** yep!, **oOTsukasaOo:** yep! that's who I'm referring to, **Lady Alexiel:** I'm glad you like it, **Dark Mimiru-chan:** well, I try..., **Anna Sartin:** Really? Awesome! Although, I looked in there and didn't see it..., **goku-the-saru:** GET WELL SOON!, **Raimu:** I'm glad you like it, **Soralover1:** I'm glad you like it and are my number one fan, **Elements:** As usual, awesome review! I loved it! Both of them!, **Moonfairyhime:** Thank you, **Empress Sarah-sama:** Thank you for the amazing critique, I didn't realize that I had made so many grammatical errors in the first one,

And that's it.

Don't expect an update tomorrow, because according to my mom, who has been urging me off the computer for the last fifteen minutes, I don't get to write a chapter tomorrow!

Until whenever I get the computer long enough to write a chapter again, good bye.

Oh, and Kousuke was from D.N.Angel. Good job to Beste and oOTsukasaOo for getting it right.

Reveiw, please!

(P.S. I apologize for any errors in this chapter, I was a bit rushed)


	14. Chapter Thirteen

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Kibethan, who's currently down on her knees apologizing for the long time between updates.

**Disclaimer:** Ki-chan (I love that nickname!) doesn't own Gravitation, and neither do I! Just kidding, we're the same person.

**Summary:** When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** As is customary, I give a half-warning before each chapter to warn readers of language that might appear in the chapter. And, there is SLIGHT language in this one.

**Chapter 13**

Yuki collapsed, but he wasn't unconscious. His legs had just merely been unable to support his weight. That didn't stop Shuichi from worrying about him though. He asked Yuki over and over again if he was all right. Only when Yuki yelled at him to shut the hell up was Shuichi appeased.

Shuichi looked sadly at Kousuke. Never again would he look upon his parents. Never again would he laugh. There was so much stuff that he would never get to do. All of the other kids in the group were crying, and even the doctors couldn't get them to stop. It didn't help that the doctors were crying as well. K took off his jacket and placed it gently over Kousuke's body, blocking it from view.

"What do we do now?" Shuichi whispered to himself. He wracked his brain thinking of something that they should do, but he couldn't think of anything. "What should we do, Yuki?" Shuichi thought that if he directed his question at another person, they might come up with the idea. Yuki had always been a sort of solid figure for him, so he thought that Yuki would definitely be the best person to ask.

Yuki mumbled an answer.

"What?" Shuichi asked him again.

"I dunno. Let's just go home." Yuki sounded so unsure of himself that Shuichi was hard pressed to follow what he had said. But, it **was** Yuki who had said it, so it had to be right, right? Besides, it sounded logical. Although, if they did want to go inside it, they should inspect it first, to make sure that no major structural damage had occurred. They would do that when they got there.

There was, though, the question of all the other people that they'd collected over the course of time. The kids, the doctors, and the bigwigs at N-G; not to mention they had the dead body of Kousuke. Who was going to volunteer to carry that? I mean they couldn't just leave it there.

"I'll carry him," Yuki said, reading his thoughts. "If that's what you're worried about."

"Yeah. What about all the other kids, though, and Suguru? Who is going to look after them? Can they come with us?"

"Yeah, just let them come with us. It'll be better if we all stay together too. Tell everybody that."

"Right." Shuichi then immediately announced that they (Shuichi and Yuki) were going to go home, and that everybody else was welcome to, nay, were encouraged to come with them. All of the adults (including the doctors) decided that that was probably a good idea, and made the executive decision for the kids that they would come with them.

"Okay, then, lead the way," K said. Shuichi nodded and helped Yuki stand up. Once he was sure that Yuki was able to be standing on his own, he moved over to Suguru. Shuichi had been carrying Suguru the entire time, and figured that an extra hour or so wasn't going to kill him. In the meantime, Yuki was busy picking up Kousuke.

Shuichi stuck Suguru onto his back and started leading the way towards where he and Yuki shared a house. Every once in a while, Yuki would chime in and tell Shuichi that the way that he was walking would lead to a dead end. The first couple of times he did that, Shuichi hadn't believed him. After he had walked into three dead ends, though, that Yuki had warned him about, he started to trust what Yuki was saying.

It took way longer than it usually did to get to their house, but eventually, they made it. By then, it has almost dark and the kids had to form a chain of hands to keep from getting lost. Luckily for them, the earth seemed to be finally starting to calm down, and save for some very minor aftershocks, they made their way to the house with no dangerous incidents.

They walked pretty much in silence the entire time, and by the end of it, Shuichi was positive that the silence was so loud that it was deafening. He willed somebody to start a conversation.

His prayers were answered when the little kids started complaining about how their feet were starting to hurt. He almost didn't care that they were complaining, and was just happy to have a break in the silence, but he gave a huge sigh anyways and was about to tell them to tough it out and that they would be there in just a few minutes, when the bigger of the little kids (the kids ten years of age and older) turned around and picked the smaller ones up, deftly shutting them up.

The experience was really beginning to bring the kids together, and Shuichi had no doubt that by the end of it (assuming that they were all alive), all of the kids would be great friends. They would be friends with the other kids, and with the adults as well, for Shuichi was really starting to like them. He silently wondered why the kids were in the hospital, and if they were going to get worse from being away from medicine that they might've been taking. He made a mental note to ask the doctors about that.

When they got to the house, Shuichi was shocked and amazed to find it still standing. Not only was it still standing, it was actually standing in relatively good shape. In fact, upon further inspection of the outside of it, he couldn't find anything wrong with it, and deemed it safe to go inside of. He was a little confused as to why it had stood up to the earthquake, when the hospital and the N-G building had not. He didn't ponder that subject for very long, however, because he wanted to get inside.

With Suguru still on his back, he cautiously entered the house, looking for signs of damage that he hadn't caught on the outside. The inside of the house was a mess. All of the things that hadn't been strapped down had been flung every which way when the shaking had started. Of course, almost everything (except the hot water heater) had been strapped down. He found things that belonged in Yuki's study in the living room. The cake that he had baked from Yuki's homecoming had flown off the kitchen counter and was lying upside down on the floor.

Shuichi started pouting; it had taken him a long time to bake that cake, and he resisted trying it until Yuki came home so that they could discover what it would taste like together. He had even taken a painstakingly long amount of time using icing to write, "Welcome Home, Yuki" on the top of it. Of course, now that the cake was upside down, it could no longer be read, and of course, it couldn't be eaten anymore either.

The house was going to be hell to clean up, but from what Shuichi saw of it –and he admits that he is no architect- the house looked safe enough to be in. He somehow managed to flip the sofa back on its feet (he heard a crunch as it fell on top of something) and he gently set Suguru on top of it. He then went outside to report that the house was safe and to invite all of the other people in.

Everybody gratefully went into the house. The doctors made a beeline directly for the phone, and after asking Yuki if they could borrow it, tested it to see if it would work. Unfortunately, no matter how many times they turned it on, they didn't get a dial tone. That complicated things greatly because they wouldn't be able to phone the kids parents and tell them that they were okay. They would have to do it the old fashioned way; they would have to go door to door.

That could wait till later though. After all, they had just gotten to this house, and the kids needed some more sleep. Yuki wasn't a hundred percent sure what to do with Kousuke's body, so he just set it down on the ground in his study, and covered it up again with some blankets. They would later have to be burned, but that didn't matter.

The kids walked into the house and immediately found some place amongst the clutter that they could sit down and they fell asleep. Shuichi started going around the house picking up things that he could here and there, setting them on tables that he turned over. With Yuki's help, the living room looked halfway decent. It was a little bit weird, having to keep moving kids out of the way (and even weirder when they didn't wake up when you moved them), but Shuichi did it anyway. In a couple of hours, the living room (not the house) was in the state that it had been in before the earthquake (completely clean because Shuichi had cleaned it in preparing for Yuki to come home).

Suguru was still on the couch, and the bed in the bedroom was in complete disarray, so Shuichi lay down on the ground besides the couch –amongst a bunch of kids- and went to sleep.

**End Chapter 13**

I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry! It's been (checks date) A WEEK, since I last updated. I'm sorry! It's been so long! But, I've had a lot of homework, so I haven't really been able to update. Also, I had a minor case of Writer's Block (I thought I was immune, but I guess not), but I'm all over that. I had a CPR class, and a book to read. I'm very sorry, but I did manage to get a chapter out, I'll try to get the next chapter out sooner.

A review of reviews:

**Kitty in the Box:** I know, I liked Kousuke too!, **emerald-jade:** I LOVE Ki-chan! Please, call me that! I'm sorry it took so long!, **goku-the-saru:** Did you actually like Kousuke, Katie?, **razatip:** I know, I know, I'm working on them, trying to keep them to a minimum (although, they keep popping up! the grammar errors), **Soralover1:** I'm glad that you like my story still!, **Cupcake:** Yeah, I know I'm making it a bit melodramatic, but, it's fanfiction..., also, he knew who Suguru was, he just couldn't remember his name. And! Finally! I'm happy that you're okay after you were in an earthquake! (which one was it?), **MC-88:** Um...it took me even longer this time...sorry... I hope you forgive me, na no da, **lemur130:** Did what I wrote you help at all? And thank you for the websites, manga costs so much!, **Seven7:** I feel bad for killing him, but more stuff will happen, don't you worry..., **Rai-chan:** I'm glad that you like it!, **PoetTears:** I'm glad that you like it, and I will keep going, **Elements:** Thank you, again for the review! I'm glad that you still like, and please stick with me!, **Lenora:** I'm glad you like it! I certainly do...except for Chapter 12, didn't really like that one..., **mizukychan:** What earthquake were you in?, **Jules:** It means a lot, even coming from a stranger. I'll be sure to finish it, **Dookin:** Please don't explode! Um...here's some Pocky to keep you together!, **Sirith:** Here ya go, a chapter.

All done!

If ya'll are ever bored, feel free to AIM me, (I've said this before), my Aim name is Kibethan. I love chatting with people!

Quiz...what is a bigwig? (I used it in the above chapter). All who win will receive virtual strawberry pocky.

Please review! They mean a lot to me! Man, the 13th ending of One Piece is awesome! (I listened to it the entire time I wrote this chapter...)


	15. Chapter Fourteen

**Title:** Earthquake

**By:** Kibethan

**Disclaimer:** The plot is mine, but most of the characters aren't.

**Summary:** When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning:** Um...I actually don't think there's a need for this...

**Chapter 14**

Yuki looked at Shuichi, who was sleeping in what looked like was the most uncomfortable position in the world. He looked so cute covered in all that blood. Wait a minute...blood?! Yuki did a double take as he realized that Shuichi was still covered in blood. He immediately started shaking him, trying to wake him up.

"Shuichi! Shuichi!" Yuki whispered loudly.

"Wha-?" Shuichi asked. Even though he had only been asleep for a little bit, he was still half asleep. "Yuki?"

"Get up, we need to get you clean."

"Nah...let's do it in the morning..." Just like that, Shuichi was back fast asleep. Yuki let out a loud growl of frustration, and figured he'd have to work on Shuichi by himself. He walked into the bathroom and fetched some towels and band-aids. He also filled up a bucket of water then carried everything back into the living room, setting the stuff down next to Shuichi.

He dipped the towels into the water and started to lightly clean the skin. On a couple of occasions, clothing blocked him, and by the end, Shuichi was mostly undressed, except for his boxers. Yuki finished up cleaning Shuichi's skin of the blood, and was pleasantly surprised that his injuries weren't as bad as he had at first thought. In fact, save for about two big gashes, the rest of his injuries were quite small. Yuki immediately put band-aids on all of the small ones. He finally got to when he'd have to deal with the big ones; he furrowed his eyebrows. He openly admitted that he wasn't a doctor, but at the moment, he certainly wished that he were one. He didn't have a clue what to do. He thought that he could just band-aid's over them, but after he'd started the first one, he figured out that he didn't have enough band-aid's to completely cover them.

Plus, there was the fact that they were still leaking a bit of blood out. The more he thought about it, the more he thought that they probably needed stitches. He was less than qualified, though, to do such a thing.

His eyes drifted across the room to where the two doctors lay. He debated waking them up for a minute, but decided that it probably wasn't a wise idea; they needed their sleep too. He slowly stood up from his crouched position next to Shuichi and walked into the bathroom, looking for a needle. He searched through all the drawers and cabinets and didn't come up with a single pointed object.

He walked into the kitchen, maneuvered around the fallen debris, and looked through all of the cabinets and drawers there. Again, he came up dry. He searched his brain, trying to figure out where he would keep a needle if he had one. His first thought was the bathroom, and he had already tried there. When he couldn't come up with an exact place, he walked into the bedroom and searched all around in there. Yet again, he didn't find one. He walked into the last place where one might possibly be; his study. He looked through drawer after drawer and still didn't find anything. When he got to the last drawer, he looked inside and saw...a spool of thread. Nothing else. He had a spool of thread, but he didn't have a needle. Red flooded through his vision, and he almost cast the spool of thread out the nearest open window. But at the last second, he caught himself and instead he just stomped out the door. After all, he'd need that thread if he ever got a needle.

Yuki wandered into the living room and plopped down next to Shuichi. He looked at the pink haired boy and when he saw that blood was _still_ leaking out he stood back up again. He was going to find a needle even if he needed to go outside of the house and down the street to the store to find one. In fact, he knew that there were needles at that store; he'd seen them before.

He slammed his fist into his palm as he made the decision to go to the store. With renewed vigor, he started walking towards the door. He was almost there, when he tripped and fell, hard. He whirled around and saw that he had tripped on Tohma's sleeping body. Tohma opened his eyes.

"Eiri? Where are you going?" he asked sleepily.

"I'm going to the store, go back to sleep, I'll be back soon."

"Oh. Okay..." Tohma said. Three seconds passed, and then Tohma's eyes shot wide open. "What!? No! It's dangerous to go out there!"

"I have to go," Yuki tried to explain, "I have to find a needle."

"The store probably won't even be standing," Tohma tried to reason with him.

"I'm going," Yuki stated, "and that's final."

"Fine. I'm coming with you then."

"No."

"Yes. I'm not letting you out of the house unless you let me come with you." Yuki looked at the determination in Tohma's eyes and saw that it would be useless to try and argue any more. He waited while Tohma stood up and shakily walked towards the door.

They exited the house together and walked towards the store. They walked in complete silence. Tohma kept opening his mouth, like he wanted to say something, but then he closed it. Finally, Yuki couldn't take it anymore.

"What is it?" he asked loudly.

Tohma winced at the harsh tone of voice. "I tried to kill Shuichi," he said quietly. Yuki looked at him in surprise. "I was jealous," Tohma continued. "Jealous that you're always worried about him and never worried about me."

"You have Mika to be worried about you," Yuki said, "You don't need me to be worried about you."

"I feel bad though," Tohma admitted, "the doctor's said it was because I had a fever. But that's not the truth at all. I knew what I was doing. I knew that I was trying to hurt him." Tohma's eyes started tearing up. Yuki's eyes widened. So the Ice King actually had some emotions?

"Don't worry about it," Yuki comforted, "I'm sure that Shuichi will forgive you."

* * *

Back at the house, Shuichi was tossing and turning. "YUKI!" Shuichi shouted as he shot sitting straight up. His eyes frantically searched around for the person who's name that he had just called. He didn't spot him anywhere, so he started to panic. "Yuki?" he called quietly into the darkness, "Where are you?" He stood up too fast and got really dizzy. He held his head in his hands for a few seconds, while the dizziness pasted. 

He ran into the other rooms, to see if Yuki was in any of them.

"He's not here." Shuichi turned around to face the voice. "He's not here," K-san repeated.

"Where is he?" Shuichi asked K-san quietly.

"He went to the store with Tohma. I heard them talking."

"He went out!?" Shuichi just about screamed. He took off in the direction of the store. He got a stitch in his side from running so hard that he had to slow down. Why had he gone out? It was dangerous to go out at night when there had just been an earthquake. After he felt his side start to loosen up, he started running again. Just up ahead, he spotted two blond heads.

* * *

Yuki and Tohma were walking along, when all of a sudden Yuki spotted a giant crack in the ground. It was right in front of them. Yuki started to shout a warning to Tohma, but it was too late, and Tohma just toppled right in. 

Tohma -jerked to awareness by his sudden lack of footing- grabbed on to the nearest ledge. He just held onto the ledge, waiting for help.

A split second later, Yuki heard someone call him name. Yuki turned around just long enough to see Shuichi come running towards him with his arms open wide in order to grab him. Unfortunately, Shuichi missed Yuki and went toppling right into the crevasse where Tohma had gone. Tohma looked up and saw Shuichi come barreling down into the crack a few feet away from him.

Just like Tohma had done, Shuichi grabbed a hold of the ledge. Yuki looked down on the both of them and saw them hanging there.

"Yuki! Help!" they both screamed up together. Yuki immediately laid himself flat against the ground the reached his hand down to them. It didn't reach. He tried to stretch his arm even farther, but he still couldn't reach. In fact, he wasn't even close. He stood up fast, mindful to not fall in, and looked around for people who might be able to help him. Of course, because it was so late out there wasn't anybody there. He turned his attention back to the two people in the crevasse.

They were both looking up at him with wide "please save me" eyes. Next, he saw something that made his heart almost stop. The ledge that Shuichi and Tohma were both holding on to was starting to crumble.

Yuki looked around for something, _anything_, which would help him. He spotted a rope close by. He quickly ran and got it. He got back on his stomach and started to put the rope into the crack.

Shuichi and Tohma were far enough apart that they wouldn't both be able to grab onto the rope at the same time. Fear was evident in their eyes as they realized that Yuki would only be able to save one of them and that the other one would fall down deeper in the crevasse.

It was up to Yuki to choose who would live.

Tohma and Shuichi both wondered...whom would Yuki choose?

**End Chapter 14**

Okay...so it's been over a week since I last updated. I'm sorry! I keep meaning to update, I swear, I swear! But...the writer's block...it's torturous! Anyway. There should only be 1-2 more chapters of this story. Fear not, though, there **will** be a sequel.

The review of reviews:

**lemur130:** Pocky for you! All of the other people are still at home..., **Suzaku no Miko Miaka-sama:** Wow...that name is long to type...I'm glad you like this story, **goku-the-saru:** Then, I'm sorry I killed him off..., **MC-88:** :CRINGE: A 10.5 earthquake isn't really possible. That'sHollywood for you...anyways, thanks for the review, **sol-nemesis:** sorry that this one wasn't quite as "prompt"as others had been, **Shirubaa Kitsune:** virtual pocky for you!, **Kittyin the Box:** Yes...poor Kousuke, **Nekura-chan:**:re-reads story: I guess you're right, I kind of did make him better. I hope this works better..., **Anna Sartin:** virtual pocky for you!, **emerald-jade:** I promise that I won't discontinue this fic...and...virtual pocky for you, **Kimika:** I'm glad you like!, **SoraLover1:** Wow...I'm really glad you like it..., **mizukychan:** You live in Chile?! That's so cool! I'm glad that you survived the EQ, **Elements:** Asalways, I love the review! Please, review me again! I always look forward to it!, **Dookin:**I'll try to put some snuggly bits in eventually..., **StrawberryPockyPoo:** No, no, I don't take offense to your help. In fact, quite the opposite, I'm glad you took the time to write such a long critique. THANK YOU...I'll try to keep in mind what youtold me to do...,**Miyael:** I'm glad you like it..., **baka-onna2003:** I'm gladthat you still like it!

And that's that! I should probably type up an excuse as to why I haven't updated in so long...but I'm not going to.

Please, review! Thank you.

-Ki-chan


	16. Chapter Fifteen

**Title: **Earthquake

**By:** Kibethan, who has a feeling that she's going to get some flames for this...she's prepared though with flame retardent clothing!

**Disclaimer:** Yay! The last time for this story! I don't own!

**Summary: **When an earthquake occurs in Japan and Yuki is in America, how will Yuki and Shuichi cope with being away from each other during this time, and will Shuichi even survive long enough to be able to be with Yuki again?

**Half-warning: **Hm...no swearing, I think, in this chapter.

**One last note! This is the LAST CHAPTER of this story. There will be a sequel, but it might not come out for a while! Thank you, people, for sticking by me even though the writing got steadily worse and more and more unbelieveable!**

_**Last time:** _

_Next, he saw something that made his heart almost stop. The ledge that Shuichi and Tohma were both holding on to was starting to crumble._

_Yuki looked around for something, anything, which would help him. He spotted a rope close by. He quickly ran and got it. He got back on his stomach and started to put the rope into the crack._

_Shuichi and Tohma were far enough apart that they wouldn't both be able to grab onto the rope at the same time. Fear was evident in their eyes as they realized that Yuki would only be able to save one of them and that the other one would fall down deeper in the crevasse._

_It was up to Yuki to choose who would live._

_Tohma and Shuichi both wondered…whom would Yuki choose?_

**Chapter 15**

Yuki rapidly looked back and forth between the two males. His mind reeled frantically as he tried to figure out which one to save. He didn't have any time to decide. The clock was ticking and if he didn't decide soon, both of them would die. Not being able to save one was hard enough, but if they both died Yuki didn't know how he'd handle it.

Finally, in a very uncharacteristic moment, Yuki let his heart decide whom to save. His eyes were practically closed as he moved the rope over to the person that he would be pulling up. He felt the weight of the person he was going to save come onto the rope, and it almost slipped out of his hands. Yuki grabbed on harder to the rope; the rough twine digging into his hands. He could feel the blood dripping out of his hands, but he dare not let go.

Nobody heard the scream of the person who had not been chosen falling into the crevasse, for the simple fact that he hadn't screamed. As soon as he had seen that Yuki had chosen the other person, he gave up and just let go, letting himself just fall into the dark hole.

Yuki very gently began to drag the rope up, thankful that the person on the other end was helping to pull their weight a little bit. Every so often, he'd come to a place where there weren't any ledges for the other person to put their feet and he'd have to call on his special reserves of strength to drag the other person up.

Man, were his arms going to hurt in the morning.

He kept on pulling at very slow pace. He wanted to move faster, but his arm strength would not allow him the luxury of going faster and getting it over with. He kept on pulling. He kept a strict hold on the rope, and took a look over the ledge to see how much farther he had to pull. Bad idea. His spirits were horribly damaged when he realized that he had only got a very short distance and there was still a very long distance to go. He hadn't realized how far down that the two males really had been.

Figuring that there was a chance that the rope that he was holding might not hold up (after all, he didn't know where it came from), he stepped back and continued his task of pulling the male up. Centimeter by centimeter, inch by inch, agonizingly slowly, Yuki was pulling up the other male.

The friction on the rope caused by Yuki pulled a heavy object out of a deep hole caused the twine to start to fray. Yuki noticed but tried not to pay any attention to it. All of his energy was focused on getting Shuichi out of the crevasse.

That's right. Shuichi. Yuki had gone with his heart, and it had said to choose Shuichi. At the moment Yuki felt **incredibly** guilty for not choosing Tohma, but what was he going to do? He didn't exactly have the time to be feeling guilty. After he got Shuichi up, that's when he'd let the depression set in. He couldn't afford to feel guilty at the moment or else he might lose his concentration and drop Shuichi. He set his mind to believe that it had only been Shuichi in the crevasse and that he only had to save one person.

It worked and soon Shuichi was moving closer and closer to the top. He could almost reach up and grab the ledge. It was only about four inches above his hand.

Yuki felt the rope start to fray more beneath his hands, as the tension got tighter towards the top of the ledge. It was fraying so much that it was at the point at which it could no longer be ignored. If Yuki didn't do something about it, it was not going to end well.

Instead of trying to continue pulling up on the rope -which would most likely make the rope break- he just held the rope in place. Slowly, he started walking himself on his stomach to the edge of the ledge, holding the rope still. Once he got to the edge he looked down. Shuichi was looking up at him wide eyes. Using all the strength that he possibly had, he continued to the rope in one place with one hand; while the other hand reached down to grab one of Shuichi's.

His arm reached where Shuichi's wrist was and he grabbed on tight.

"Shuichi! Grab my hand!" Shuichi heard the words, but it was obvious that his terror stricken mind wasn't registering what was being said to him. He cocked his head and gave Yuki a blank look. "My hand! My hand! Grab my hand!" Still, Shuichi just stared up with him with a cocked head and wide blank eyes. Yuki groaned in annoyance as he tried to hold the rope up. He had a tight grip on Shuichi's wrist, but he would feel a lot better if Shuichi had a tight grip on his wrist. That way, there was a better chance that Shuichi wouldn't just slip out of his grip.

His mind tried to think of ways to make Shuichi understand him, but he was coming up with no ideas. His arms were throbbing and his shoulders felt like they were just shy of popping out of their sockets completely. All in all, his upper body was in massive pain. He couldn't give up though. Since Shuichi was being very unresponsive to his calls, he would just have to trust himself that his grip was tight enough. Holding onto Shuichi's right wrist with a death grip, he let go of the rope and grabbed onto the wrist with his other hand.

When Shuichi felt the rope go slack, he gave a start. He then felt Yuki's wrist around his own and using his own brain, determined that it might be a wise idea to grab on. After all, Yuki's hands were currently the only things that were keeping Shuichi from falling back down into the dark crevasse with Tohma.

Yuki gave a quiet whoop when he finally felt Shuichi grab onto him. Now the only thing he needed to do was pull the boy up. Unfortunately, the position he was currently in (lying on his stomach with his arms hanging over the side) was a very difficult position to be in when you wanted to pull something up.

Usually, when put in that kind of position, you use one hand to pull up, and the other to help pull yourself up. Yuki didn't have that luxury, however, since he had to use both hands to make sure that Shuichi didn't fall down.

He didn't have to get Shuichi all the way up, only about four inches, after that Shuichi would be able to reach the ledge and get out practically all on his own. Unfortunately, pulling up a dead weight is harder than it seems. People, when dead weights, seem to weigh a lot more than they actually do. Yuki was thanking his lucky stars that Shuichi was quite thin and therefore relatively lighter than he could have been.

Taking a deep breath and exhaling a few times, Yuki prepared himself to use the final amount of strength that his arms had. His arms had begged and pleaded with him for several minutes to just let go, or take a break and then keep going. It hadn't worked and now they were threatening to go on strike if the pain continued.

"Brat, I'm going to count to three. On the three, be prepared to grab the ledge, okay?" Shuichi nodded. "One…two…three!" With a single burst of energy, Yuki lifted Shuichi just high enough to grab onto the ledge. In the burst of energy, he managed to blow out the last of the strength in his arms, and they just fell limply in front of him.

Shuichi had managed to grab onto the ledge and was now waiting for Yuki to get out of the way so he could pull himself up. Yuki rolled to the side, and Shuichi –with his last bit of arm strength- pulled himself out of the crevasse. He lied down next to Yuki.

For the next few minutes they just lay there, panting heavily. Shuichi put his head on Yuki's shoulder. Yuki was way too tired to push him off. Besides, he wasn't sure if he'd want to push him off. After what he had just went through, Shuichi was definitely going to stay closer to him than ever before.

"Thank you, Yuki, for choosing me," Shuichi murmured into Yuki's ears. Yuki's eyes shot open. He had completely forgotten about Tohma! He had needed to block his mind about Tohma while he was rescuing Shuichi, but now that Shuichi was safe, his mind flooded with the realization that Tohma was most likely dead.

Yuki rolled back onto him stomach, looking down into the crevasse to see where Tohma had been.

Emptiness.

Tohma was no longer there. Seeing as it was beginning to get light out, he probably hadn't been there for quite a long time. It had taken hours to get Shuichi out of the crack.

Guilt flooded through Yuki's system as he realized that he hadn't even seen when Tohma had fallen. He hadn't even said, "I'm sorry" to him when he had picked Shuichi. Not like it would have mattered. It would've been like saying "I'm sorry" when you were about to kill someone. And that's how Yuki felt. He felt like he had just killed someone. Tears should have filled his eyes, but strangely enough they didn't. His emotions just weren't working right.

Shuichi had already fallen asleep next to him, most likely from all the excitement and the near death experience.

From pure exhaustion, Yuki fell asleep beside him.

_An angelic voice was heard in his head. "You chose correctly, you chose correctly," it said to him over and over again, as if on repeat. Yuki turned towards the voice to see who was saying it, but, as always, it seemed as if the voice didn't come from anywhere. The voice seemed somewhat familiar, but he just couldn't figure out who it was. Oh well…Shuichi was safe, and that's all the matters._

_"Are you sure that's all that matters?" a cruel mocking voice said. "What about Tohma? You killed your own brother-in-law! What will Mika, your own sister, think? Murderer! Murderer! Murderer!" The mocking voice chanted in his head. Slowly, it was beginning to drown out the voice that was telling him that he had done a good job. Soon, the angelic voice was no longer heard, and all that Yuki could hear was "Murderer! Murderer!"_

_He shook his head back and forth, trying to dispel the bad dream. It wasn't working. The voice taunted him, telling him that he had done the wrong thing. That he was a murderer. Of course, this he already knew, but now he had murdered his own brother-in-law!_

Yuki was plagued by the nightmare the entire time he was asleep. His conscious wasn't even giving him the relief of waking himself up. He finally woke up when he felt Shuichi shaking him.

"Yuki! Yuki wake up! We need to get back to the house." Yuki's eyes shot open. He looked at Shuichi, who was peering down at him, and nodded.

Standing up slowly, he started walking towards his house with Shuichi. His arms still hung limply at his sides, his arms were not going to be able to move for quite a while. There was dried blood on the inside of his and Shuichi's palms from the twine rope.

They got to the house and were greeted with everybody –including the kids- asking them were they had been. Yuki and Shuichi just brushed off their questions and walked into the living room. It was still the only part of the house that was even remotely organized.

K instantly noticed that they were lacking someone.

"Where's Tohma?" he asked. Their grave looks told him immediately where Tohma was. "What happened?" he asked.

Yuki grunted and Shuichi just murmured. It was quite obvious that they didn't want to talk about it. Everyone had figured out that Tohma was dead, and the children started crying from the loss of yet another person. Most of the adults moved to comfort them, but they were a little lackluster themselves.

One of the doctors noticed the blood on Yuki and Shuichi's hands and got some bandaged to wrap it up. While he was at it, he pulled out a needle and some thread from a pocket and –after telling Shuichi that it was going to hurt- began to patch him up.

Yuki's jaw dropped. The doctor had had thread the entire time! Tohma's death really had been pointless. Feeling worse than he had ever felt in almost his entire life, Yuki closed off his emotions completely. It was a pointless death that had been his entire fault. From now on, he wasn't going to show any emotions. If he did, he didn't think that he'd be able to take the guilt.

* * *

Shuichi looked at the battle that looked like was going on in Yuki's mind. He wondered what the blond was thinking. Shuichi could tell that Yuki thought that he had killed Tohma –seeing him tossing and turning in the night saying "I'm not a murderer" had been proof enough of that- and he hoped that Yuki wasn't thinking of doing anything stupid. 

Well…it didn't matter. Shuichi would be there to protect him, and he'd stand by him, no matter what.

That was his plan anyway.

**End Chapter 15**

**End Story**

Oh my Gosh! It's over! It's over! does a little dance I actually finished something! I'm sorry that it took such a long time to get it out...but ye-haw! I finished! There will bea sequel, don't worry.

Um...a review of reviews!

**goku-the-saru:** You stuck it out with me till the end. Thanks!, **lemur130:** You also stuck it out with me until the end...thank you so much!, **MC-88:** Phew...as long as you knew that a 10.5 isn't really possible...na no da! Man...I'm going to miss your reviews...unless you keep reviewing my other story!, **Shirubaa Kitsune:** I know :frowns: it did get a bit dramatic, but I couldn't end it on a boring note, could I?, **Dark Mimiru-chan:** Yep, oh so horrible, **Tricksters girl:** I know he is...but it's hard to me to him, isn't it?, **emerald-jade:** You're a person that's been with me since the beginning! Thank you so much!, **Notta Writer:** Glad you like it..., **dookin:** hehehehe, **Sliefoxx:** I think I actually replied to this by e-mail, didn't I? Thanks for the giant critique! I really appreciate it!, **Silver on the Tree:** Man, my ability for writing Ooc is really starting to piss me off! It's a problem that I always have, and I'm trying to stop it!, **ddz008:** I'm glad that you like it!, **Lara:** I know, I hate all the death and destruction they cause too, **Elements:** :sniff: I'm going to miss your awesome reviews!...unless of course, you review my other story! :hint hint:, **Kali Swifteye:** A lot of people don't like Tohma, **DarkGatomon:** The way I see it, even though I write relatively badly, I still keep your interest! Yay! I'm glad that even though you don't like the last bit, you'll still read the last chapter! Thank you so much!, **shady gurl:** I guess I'm just good at that..., **Wynjara:** I'm glad that you like it!

That's it!

Once again, thank you so much for sticking it out to the end with me! Expect a sequel! It will eventually be coming! I promise! After all, I did leave a couple of things hanging...

Anyway, it's currently 1:21 a.m., my mom told me an hour ago to go to bed, so I think that's where I'm headed next! Thank you again! If you ever miss some of my writing, just read Blindsided! And look for my christmas special starting well...tomorrow (12/14).

Until next time!

Ja ne!

Ki-chan


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